Cattle Prods and the IMF

NGO Economy in Haiti

2011-07-23T04:44:00.001+05:30

I’m trying to understand how a country rebuilds itself when the actors that claim to be contributing to the reconstruction of homes and infrastructure, provision of health and éducation, security, social and business enterprise, and production of domestic products and livelihoods, only invest and purchase goods and services from private, often élite and foreign businesses ? A country with (some estimâtes) 70% unemployment (which may include the massive informal economy – e.g. odd jobs, shoe repair, selling street food, sex work, contraband) may have diffculties finding public revenue to put back into its own recovery. Instead, many professional jobs are to foreign workers (like a reverse Dubai labour migration flow) who don’t always pay taxes due to the nature of the « volunteerism » sector. It’s well known that UN technicrats get paid bloated « stipends » or perdiems that can be extended in contracts for months, if not years. But even the modest expat NGO worker can receive as much as the highest paid Haitian staff in an organization. Although not a handsome rémunération, it can still pay the bills, so that you do not have to starve to survive, that your food budget isn’t put all towards housing or utilities. And whatever surplus exists is easily used for entertainment or travel.

If there is a Haitian working class, it’s not as if there are huge left-overs to put back into the country’s development, through such mechanisms as luxury taxes. The répétition of digging one’s own grave, amounts to little hope in long-term solutions and folks want escapism in any way possible. Liquor, for instance, is subsidized, so that it is affordable to a wider majority ; whereas food prices are ridiculously high. No wonder the major advertisements are for whisky, mobile phone service, and beach parties, as opposed to Home Depot.

We know Haiti’s one of the poorest countries in the world, with an annual income of about $11 billion -- this may not reflect the downfall in the economy after the earthquake. (This clearly cannot compare to US Senate’s récent passing of a $600+ billion price tag for 2011-2012 military budget.) Haiti can only continue to be dépendent on other countries: mostly US for its free market wheeling-and-dealing, Canada for its large humanitarian spending, (2nd after Afghanistan), and Chinese and Korean télécommunications investment. But again, the conditions that créate this dependency need to be eradicated, with revitalized efforts to emphasise its domestic development.

Perhaps protect its agriculture and livestock for one, so that people can fucking eat. What’s the point of growing your own shit if US eggs, Costa Rican pineapple, Israeli pickles and nuts, MONSANTO seeds and fertilizer, flood the market and cost half of what’s yours ? And how can Haiti afford to pay for $5-6/gallon of petrol when there is no public transportation and the roads are jammed with NGO cars or tap-taps ? Transportation of everything through the shoddy road system into the inner parts of the country, make it difficult to meet delivery times or get to domestic markets.

At least its remittances account for almost 20% of the GDP and twice the earnings from exports (CIA 2011). But this hardly goes into widespread infrastructure development, --rather only to keep family members afloat.

And we can look to how the international finance vultures, the IMF and World Bank, have used the devastating disasters as an opportunity to shore up more debts on Haiti. Before the earthquake, Haiti received debt forgiveness for over $1 billion through Highly Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) initiative, and another $400 million was cancelled by donor countries in 2010 – levelling its balance. So it’s revolting that the new Mickey Mouse President is in discussion and already agreeing to new loans, when maybe the issue is how is its annual budget (largely from foreign aid) being spent ?

Right, so I’m not convinced of the renewal of the mandate for the CIRH to rebuild Haiti, (http://haitianpost.com/2011/07/23/haiti-la-commission-de-reconstruction-prolongee). Which essentially, continues the flow of (and governance by) NGOs, albeit through a convoluted registry system, despite having virtually no solid needs analysis for the kinds of NGOs/experts/workers for which to appeal. Nor is it just to sit, arms crossed, while an inept head of state listens to the same business and International Finance Institution cronies, without any real forums for Haitian civil society to stake their claims. Instead, where is the leveraging and solidifying of Haitian or quartier-par-quartier community organizations, non-profits and coopératives to refresh the antiquated notions of réhabilitation and reconstruction ? How can I place myself in a system where I am not perpetuating the immense inequalities and injustices, bending over for the donors’ dollar, and not putting it back into the same malevolent private industries that have ravaged the country for the past few centuries?

Expats - Part I

2011-01-13T10:17:00.000+05:30

It’s rather ironic to talk to some of the expat colleagues, on the very anniversary of the earthquake, about what they see as injustices. We had a small gathering amongst the coordinators of all the projects, Haitians and expats alike, around our pristine, reverable palace, by the pool, gorging on grilled pork, stuffed aubergines, bacon-pecan-crusted potato salad, crevettes, saucisson, olives, too much wine, rum and béer, and a beetroot chocolaté gâteau. Not only did most expats not attempt to incorporate our Haitian friends in the discussions or joviality, but later they accused us of not knowing the local situation and how it is to live in want.

The expats’ -- maybe just to chalk it up to a select group of québécois expats, most of whom are on their first mission or work expérience abroad -- idea of want is to live sans internet and all the amenities they consider « normal » for a few days, as they have to make the transition to another résidence. The move has been one of many difficult negotiations : for the proprietor to finish all the réhabilitation work, thereby probably exploiting a labour force during the holiday season, in order to have hot showers, functioning electricity, gorgeously-made furniture procured, kitchen in function. The proprietor, of course, has many justifiable reasons for delays, in terms of obtaining permits and other bureaucratic necessities to do the work, as well as many excuses, invoking concerns of security from récent violent political manifestations (even tho there were none for the last month). Point is, there are reasons for delays, and why things don’t go so smoothly in Port-au-Prince.

But I find it hard to digest, at this dinner, when talking amonst our Haitian staff who participated in our fete, to find out that they do not have TV, radio, internet, running water, many friends nearby or with free time, access to alcohol to wash away their already congested malaise with the situation in Haiti . This is normal hère. So to impose any other perspective is completely luxurious and irrelevant. Instead, when telling aforementioned expat malakas, that they will be without internet or a few amenities for 1 or 2 days, I enter angry conflicts claiming how unfair it is, how they could possibly live like « nuns » ?

How they could possibly reflect on such a day of immense dévastation and incompréhensible human suffering, that their wants outweigh the dignity and essential needs of every fucking person around them. When just 50 feet away are tent cities, where people are forced to eek by, contining to do so one year after the earthquake. This disconnect and « otherness » is too sickening to describe. So don’t blame me if I don’t regularly partake in their célébrations and social activities, in a country that I can’t help think deserves sober commitment, gratitude, and opportunities upon which to learn more from folks who have come to know profoundly about life, death and aspiration, plus des autres places I’ve been fortunate enough to go.

Henceforth, I feel quite lost and disillusioned in terms of the fuckwits that we keep recruiting ; is it part of some sick québécois nationalist joke ? Why send people with no previous project management expérience to do the jobs of Haitians ? Why assert such rhetoric that we are in collaboration and capacity-building partnerships with our Cite Soleil comrades (true, we do have more established liasions and histories within our projects than some of the other foreign NGOs) when we turn around to burn our beneficiaries, through lack of communication, lack of trust, lack of consulation, lack of empathy.

Or am I just imagining such ego-centricism ? Even if my French is not perfect, I know an asshole when I see one.

So yeah, I am blown away that even though I had another violent argument with a lush, even in front of my Director General, that the favor goes to the megalomaniac, whinging blan -- that their needs are ultimately superior than every bloody person I see and meet during my day. These kinds of disparities, discrimination, ségrégation, subjugation, patriarchical attitudes, etc etc etc, that one sees in Haiti are at the very frontlines -- made more visible hère -- of the kinds we witness and absorb in our every day lives in other parts, perhaps more privileged regions of the Western Hemisphere.

I cannot write enough, or sufficiently express the rage I have, within this context…but hopefully this bequeaths some sort of knowledge that can transcend my anger into discussion, dissémination and action!

Premiers jours

2010-10-18T01:13:00.003+05:30

Our business is treating the poorest of the sick. So when it rains, we have a lot of business. That’s because a huge portion of the sicknesses, like acute respiratory infection, diarrhea and fever of unknown origin, are coming from lots of damp, lots of standing water (which breeds mosquitoes), and inadequate living conditions overall. When you look at this pathology, you wonder what prevents folks here in Haiti from having solid shelters and functioning water/drainage systems. Even before the earthquake. But it’s quite clear, in-your-face, that the earthquake exacerbated, exponentially, the realities of poverty, bringing with it crises-level health cases.

Initial impressions of Port-au-Prince are confusing, especially when I am trying to formulate them in my foggy, coerced French. There are many similarities to Sri Lanka, the streams of people in every direction, small-scale vendors crowding the sidelines to earn a meager living, the random gestures, daily actions, and deeply scarred looks in people’s eyes that suggest that every breath and movement is for sheer survival. The earthquake certainly thrust together everyone but the uber-mega-nauseatingly rich. Yet you can still see class distinctions within the refugee population. Perhaps by those folks better dressed, or being able to send their children to school instead of fetching water, or seeing some women care for their hair and makeup, or braiding their girls’ hair with intricate patterns of bows and plastic clips, or men wearing freshly pressed suits when going to church. But why bother grooming at all?

To hold onto their dignity.

Which is continually eroding even after the earthquake. Not that over 200 years of occupation, internal conflict, really shitty governments (consorting with our own shitty governments) and absolute destitution hadn’t already kept the country and its people from catching a break. But somehow, after everything impoverished Haitians have been through, and knowing the unimaginably vast destruction of the earthquake, it is the continuation of the horror stories, maybe that are not visible in the media, that make this place even more difficult to work in and understand. It is these horror stories that really urge me to seek out or latch onto any behvioural nuance that suggests people are trying to make it better for themselves, and say ‘fuck off’ to the various international actors and corrupt government leeches, which take advantage of the plight of poverty to attain power and political ends.

So when I hear other NGO actors complain that Haitian authorities or health agents or other focal points are “difficult” to work with, I wonder if it isn’t really instead the presence of a boatload of foreign workers? The neo-colonial aspects of this kind of NGO work, indeed, has followed me, even been amplified. First, I must live in an immaculate villa with pristine pool overlooking the destitution below. I can’t complain, of course it’s comfortable, but I wonder how this separation and detachment is doing any good at understanding the needs just outside our compound. Our team consists of amazing people, all with good intentions, but for some this is their first experience working abroad and maybe they are already caught up in the privileged lifestyles, the ability to vacation, have bbqs, acquire cirrhosis of the liver, with beaucoup de disposable money. Of course, for security reasons (rampant attacks, thefts, rapes, kidnappings of Haitians and NGO workers) we abide by curfew laws and lock ourselves away after working hours. We must leave Cite Soleil by 330pm to avoid interceptions with gangs. But this quarantined lifestyle puts us in a position to look the other way, ignore extreme desperate requests for help (such as by panhandling children) and maybe not take back what we do in the field into our own personal lives.

With this, I have a problem. I am fresh-faced, eager and ready to attend to whatever is needed. And I know my limitations and privilege, as someone coming from the Miami area – a place already with some disconnect, or blind-sightedness to the plights and turmoil of Haiti. I know I cannot understand fully the degradation and continual hopelessness, nor the conditions of extreme poverty. I can only listen and hope to integrate some demands into our work, as a medical NGO worker, striving to provide primary healthcare services, with focuses on maternal/child health, HIV treatment and malnutrition, in an already overlooked part of Port-au-Prince --- the slums of Cite Soleil. Yet I still yearn for that connection outside my imposed palace walls. Maybe it is easier to be a “blan” man, with more mobility to ask these questions and manoevre through the city, maybe without as much confrontation by Haitian men?

Some initial observations include the immense strength and ability to survive by folks in Port-au-Prince. On my first day, I saw a girl barely over 12 carrying a huge oil barrel on her head. Even if it was empty, I have no idea how she could carry it. And the young boy, during school hours, fetching water from the public water pump. And the women cautiously entering the public showers, which are situated in the middle of a round-about intersection, immediately in front of a massive tent city existing in a public square, of sorts. These folks could be anyone that we know, if we were hit by an enormous quake, with 95% of the buildings crumbling and land-sliding down on top of each other. What would we do? Would we be able to survive in the amazingly strong way that Port-au-Prince folks have? Would we be able to have the same smiles, dancing and gyrating lasciviously to techno-ized Creole music at the public beaches, create magnificent art to sell in between all the small vendors, donkeys and chaos? Would we have the capacity to look after our neighbour and see them as comrades in this struggle?

So, indeed, these first days, there is a lot to adjust to, on top of struggling to work completely in French, but the most difficult thing is integrating again into the expat lifestyle with all its contradictions, privileges, and disconnect. But also I am persevering, knowing that we are providing essential medical services and that we have good relations with the folks we are serving.

Will keep sending my thoughts, as things evolve…

comme ca...in the Western Sahara

2009-02-01T01:48:00.005+05:30

Hola companeros -

Greetings from the Sahara!

To give you an update about the recent transitions in my life:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=175241&l=23089&id=690080320

…After nearly 3 years of what felt like being embedded in hypocrisy, due to the disconnect from and esoteric representation of people living in poverty - facing hardships quite different than what is faced in the west where I was bred - I left one plush ivory tower in Colombo to pursue a more challenging mission.

This mission takes place among a people who have been surviving a ‘forgotten’ crisis, for 33 years, with the Western Saharan people, the Saharawis, also considered as part of the bedoin collectivity of Northern Africa. The first discussion I properly had - with Ali, director of the central pharmacy in Dakla - advised me not to write, document or project the experiences of the Saharawis, because as forever external, I can never know the torment of being illegally occupied by Morocco, perpetual fighting with arms and diplomacy, and forced into exile into one of the most desolate, barren, inhospitable places on our planet. But rather I should film, photograph, or try to reach people who have not heard about this immense struggle - for liberation, recognition by the international community and enjoyment of autonomy - through my emotions. Thus, as I write to you about my first experiences, I shall largely omit some of the political, social and historical details, quantification, bloody human development indices, and other norms that enraptured social scientists use – instead I refer you to Toby Shelley’s overview, Endgame in the Western Sahara.

This omission is my limitation to expanding maybe your own interest in this cause, but I have had to forget everything that I have read, heard about or learned through the Western Sahara liberation campaigns – because this reality is often so inexplicable, contradictory and challenging to the previous representations of the Saharawis.

I am supposing what would help get you up to speed are the following:

- illegal occupation by Morocco in Western Sahara Occidental since colonial Spain pulled out in 1975, leading to broken promises for resolving the plight and self-determination of the Saharawis, and to Mauritania and Morocco battling for the territory; later Mauritania withdrew from claims for the mineral, fish and natural resource-rich territory
- subsequent violent exile of the Saharawis to near Tindouf, Southwestern Algeria, as well as unknown numbers of Saharawis still residing in the W.S. territory occupied by Morocco
- numbers are political, which comes out later in the difficulties in knowing how to provide medicines to everyone (UN estimates are around 125.000 persons, but looking across each wilaya, or township, they could easily be over 200.000 persons in SW Algeria alone).
- there exists a sliver of ‘free zone’ between occupied Western Sahara and Algeria, lined by minefields on Morocco side
- still political tensions between Morocco and Algeria on this issue (not helping their war in 1980s and 1990s)
- Polisario are the political party in government ‘representing’ the Saharawis
- failed referendum (Baker Plan) by UN in 2003, so stagnation since then
- deadlock and stagnation over their self-determination by the international community – so put pressure on your government representative to push for a referendum!
- there is already loads of information, speculation, propaganda etc on the web and in media, so you can supplement my writing
- I am here because it is a humanitarian crisis – on many levels – and because I am capable, passionate, curious and hopefully convincing you to keep this cause in mind.

…I guess I don’t know where to begin on why I have been absent and impossible to reach – but let’s face it, I’m in the middle of the desert. The best advice on what I was told to prepare is to bring a sense of humour and that there are a lot of liquor shops in Algiers – whenever I pass through there…But with this medical NGO mission I have not had time to breathe. I am coordinating a mission to provide 80% of the pharmaceutical provisions to the long-term refugee population, as well as help construct a standardized health system and manage medical waste in all the health facilities for this nation – mostly in the 4 main camps (Dakla – the farthest, Smara, El Ayoun and Aousserd, named after the cities left behind in the occupied territories). So in some ways, I have been dropped in the desert, with limited support and financial security from headquarters in Athens, expected to swim and find my way through this quicksand.

Luckily, I have an amazing, close-knit team of 3 Algerian guys and an Italian chiquita – oddly no Greeks - who have made me feel immediately welcomed and shown me the ropes, especially with the language barriers. I am improving my French and Spanish, comprehending more than I can speak, and trying to pick up some Hassini Arabic.

Hamdu ‘lillah!

I live in the NGO Protocol, in Rabouni with about 25 permanent expats, and mucho ‘solidarity tourists’ who come for a few days or a week here and there, as part of official delegations, medical commissions or presumptuous researchers. We each have our objectives, which makes for a coordination debacle, and raises questions of impact and dependency creation - for everything - on the NGO industry…

It is like living in a rudimentary hostel, with a lot of cockroaches, flies and begging semi-domesticated cats, squalid squat latrines, cold bucket bathing (we have some underground water sources), creative uses for water conservation and recycling (we are even trying to sprout onions in our kitchen courtyard), disconnect from the world due to dodgy internet and mobile connections, and testing of one’s tolerance to megalomaniac, Spanish dominance in the field, and cartoonish neighbours. My narrow room that I share with our medical coordinator has very thin walls, which does little to muffle our large Italian elephant neighbour who consumes 30 eggs a day and snores/shags his girlfriend loudly. But there are some of the most beautiful, expansive starlit skies here – extremely dry, sometimes with scorching dry heat days, and chilly, windy evenings. Right now I am freezing in my poorly insulated room, waiting for massive sandstorm to pass…

Comme ca…

I try to keep tranquil and balanced with attempts at sunrise yoga and meditation and long sunset runs through the desert. It is amazing running through the Sahara, like flying, as the terrain is sometimes bouncy, sometimes rocky – like running on the moon! It can be quite shocking though as the first time I tried to find a good path I ended up running through what I learned was a camel abattoir – still fresh corpses rotting away. This makes it sometimes dangerous as there are also packs of famished, wild dogs that could easily hunt me down. The other sad thing is that I must pass by the camel ‘waiting room’, so the few camels I see each week, slowly wait their death and dwindle in numbers – thus I have fewer curious gazers as I run by.

Food is basic, unmentionable – a lot of lentils, pasta, potatoes with onions, and Friday lunch of couscous and camel – I have largely abandoned vegetarianism, especially if I am offered food from a family in their haima (tents attached to their adobe domiciles). I really do not feel comfortable discussing in detail about the private homelife among these families, except that they are some of the most hospitable, warmest, affectionate people I have met. In general though, I learned that Saharawis are largely matriarchal, with women largely participating in high professional jobs as well as in municipal governments and having considerable influence in the private sphere in some ways. I learned that when women marry, the husband comes to live in the wife’s family compound – and the land, assets, wealth are passed down to the brother-in-law to be kept for their daughters. Sons go to their wives’ families and there are some practices of bigamy, not to mention extramarital affairs. Perhaps this can be seen as attaining more wealth, status, etc through reliance on women as an economic medium.

I cannot write too much, in my naivete, about the complications within the gendered social structure – only that there are clear existing gendered inequalities and inequities: even though women do largely participate in public offices and decision-making bodies, often holding highly skilled jobs, they still carry double burdens of carrying the household responsibilities – preparing enormous servings of too-sweet tea, procreating in a context without contraception and family planning (government policy), and basically married in order to gratify the needs of the husband and parents.

Of course, economically, socially, politically, things have been changing dramatically this last decade and half, since permanent NGO interventions, increased migration (securing remittances from abroad) and the very odd Spanish vacation time given for every child each year…People are fairly progressive and liberal, and largely influenced by communist and socialist ideas; Che, Fidel and their own Polisario martyrs adorn the walls of schools, public institutions. Interestingly, as part of international aid schemes, the younger generation mostly have gone abroad to study, mostly in Cuba (termed ‘cubarawis’) and Spain, so there are a lot of doctors, pharmacists, psychiatrists, IT specialists, lawyers, judges, politicians, teachers (one of our drivers is a Spanish teacher who studied 14 years in Cuba – hopefully inclined enough to help me with courses) etc – but they often cannot find jobs in the countries of study, so must return to the camps for a life of interminable waiting. They are savvier about NGO work and our donor relations than perhaps we are. Hence, there is pervasive frustration and even a feeling of ‘what-to-do?’ among folks, which comes up later in terms of how we can carry out our work.

I guess this is a lot to digest for now…I hope to find more time to put thoughts down regarding the actual complications with implementing our project; badly constructed NGO approaches; the role of branding and consumerism as a manifestation of status among Saharawis (they mostly drive Mercedes, wear designer sunglasses…); projections of what folks like you can do – despite, I know, the current overbearing problems we all face; underlying and persistent new form of colonialism by Spain (e.g. sex tourism); lackadaisical UN structure here; etc.

For now just know that I am safe, energetic, dedicated, reawakened. I’ll try to keep things shorter in the next rambling I pass along…hopefully, these photos can also give you some food for thought!

Welcome to this (often forgotten) world –

Big hugs, enduring love and beauty in your lives,

Paz, paix, salaam!

3,500 Tamils arbitrarily detained in Colombo

2007-12-04T09:27:00.000+05:30

On Sunday, check points and security measures were amped up to the point that all buses, pedestrians and other vehicles were stopped and searched. In the process the army and police detained about 3,500 Tamils (some of whom were also Singhalese or Muslims) including children as young as 7 years old. This is all under the pretense that all Tamils are terrorists. In cramped, squalid detention centres, sometimes with a 100 people to a room or 100 people to one toilet, people wait out their detention and hoping for release. Opposition leaders and representatives from Tamil parties have been outcrying to the president for the release of the civilians. After two days nothing has been done. No rule of law, no justice, only misery and fear.

Seeking solidarity from you....

War for Peace is like Shagging for Virginity

2007-06-09T13:18:00.001+05:30

A war strange as fiction

Jun 7th 2007 | BATTICALOA, COLOMBO AND JAFFNA
From The Economist print edition

An opportunistic president and a dyed-in-the-wool rebel appear to have ended Sri Lanka's best-ever hope for peace

SITTING in a refugee camp outside Batticaloa, in eastern Sri Lanka, Radikhela, a skinny 21-year-old in a pink pinafore, softly describes how her father died. He had his hands cut off, his belly sliced open, and then was beaten in the dust until he expired. His crime was to have been forced into skivvying for Sri Lanka's rebels, a ruthless guerrilla army and suicide cult known as the Tamil Tigers. His killers were from another Tamil militant group, in the pay of Sri Lanka's democratically elected government. Radikhela knows this: her 13-year-old brother was forced to watch the murder, then join the murderers.

More typically, however, the refugees—of whom there are over 100,000 near Batticaloa—describe a less savage sort of warfare. They heard artillery shells exploding near their villages, and they ran. Sometimes the army, which, like the government, is almost entirely composed of Buddhist Sinhalese, a bullying majority, told them the bombardment was coming. At any rate, in nine months of almost constant artillery barrage, mostly by the army, which has depopulated much of Sri Lanka's formerly Tiger-held east, the shelling has killed only around 100 civilians.

As the refugees speak, crowding together on the blistering sand or under wilting plastic sheeting, a periodic ground-muffled boom resounds. From the roads and villages that it controls, every few minutes, the government is shelling the green jungle beyond.

The Conradian imagery is appropriate. There is something strange about Sri Lanka's 24-year ethnic war, a mismatch of high and low intensity, of first world and third, that almost savours of fiction. Horrors like that visited upon Radikhela and her family should not be happening in Sri Lanka. With an income per head of $1,350, almost twice India's, it is a bright star of South Asian development. Its economy grew by an average of 5% during the 1990s, even as the war raged. It grew by around 7% last year, when the war was re-ignited after an unprecedented three-year pause. And this growth also came despite the devastating tsunami of December 2004, in which 35,000 Sri Lankans died.

What is more, Sri Lanka is an unusually delightful war-torn country. Half a million tourists last year are a sign of that. It has well-watered hills, rolling green tea estates and miles of palm-fringed white sands. Sri Lanka's almost wholly literate inhabitants, 75% of them Sinhalese and 12% Sri Lankan Tamils, share an understandable pride in their island. Away from the war zone—despite a history of pogroms and other discrimination against the minority group—they seem to rub along reasonably well.

In fact, almost half of Colombo, the island's seaside capital of a million people, is Tamil or Tamil-speaking Muslim. More Tamils live peaceably in government-controlled areas than in the north-eastern enclave held by the rebels, whose full name is the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). In the way of ambitious minorities, these Tamils thrive in business, as do Sri Lanka's Muslims.

Meanwhile an ugly war that has claimed over 70,000 lives flickers and, as currently, flares. Last year, according to official figures, more people died violently in Sri Lanka than in Afghanistan. In the past 18 months over 5,000 have been killed, compared with fewer than 200 in the previous three years. Sri Lankan pundits are calling this violence “Eelam War IV”: the fourth round in the struggle for an Eelam, or independent Tamil homeland. A ceasefire, brokered by Norway in 2002, is officially still in place. Yet government and Tigers are both preparing for bigger battles. A peaceful resolution to Sri Lanka's conflict may never have looked less possible.

As the shells rained around Batticaloa on June 2nd, the Tigers launched a fierce night attack along the front line near Omanthai, south of their northern fief. The Tigers say they killed 30 soldiers. The army says it killed 52 Tigers, including many of the child fighters that their leader, a tyrannical hermit called Velupillai Prabhakaran, prefers. Both sides are prone to lie. But on June 5th the Tigers handed over 13 army corpses to the Red Cross.

Strategies of terror

Yet many, perhaps most, of the war's victims did not fall in pitched battle. Guerrilla and terrorist attacks by the Tigers have cost hundreds of soldier and civilian lives. On May 28th seven soldiers and civilians were killed, and dozens wounded, by a Tiger roadside bomb in Colombo. On May 24th the Tigers claimed to have killed 32 sailors in an attack by their naval wing, the Sea Tigers, on an island off the isolated government-held Jaffna peninsula.

The government of President Maninda Rajapakse also uses terrorism. More than 300 Tamil civilians, including many with family links to the Tigers, have been murdered in Jaffna alone. Armed members of a Tamil political party, the Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP), allegedly with close ties to army spies, have been accused of some of these killings.

In Jaffna, M.V. Kanamylnathan, editor of the leading Uthayan newspaper, has decorated his office walls with photographs of the bloodied corpses of his journalists. Last year, on Press Freedom Day as it happened, two of his staff were shot dead at their computers by masked men.

After the Tiger attack near Omanthai, on June 5th, the army chief, Lieut-General Sarath Fonseka, said it was time for a new ceasefire. If he meant it, this would be a big strategic shift by the government. Earlier this year, after a visit to Sri Lanka's holiest Buddhist site, Sri Dalada Maligawa, General Fonseka promised to “annihilate” the Tigers.

Alas, there are reasons to doubt the general's change of heart. His comment this week looked suspiciously well-timed to coincide with a visit from Yasushi Akashi, a so-called “peace envoy” from Japan, Sri Lanka's biggest aid donor. Moreover, when the government has experienced setbacks, it tends to tone down its pugnacity. It did so after a disastrous attack launched from Jaffna last October, in which independent reports suggest that around 200 soldiers were killed and six tanks (nearly half of the army's total) were captured, with not a yard gained.

In an interview last week, General Fonseka seemed uncertain what strategy the government was pursuing. Asked if he would continue attacking the Tigers in the north, he said: “We don't have anything on the drawing-board...there will be a political solution, there will be peace talks.” Yet at the same time, “A political solution can never come while the LTTE is strong.”

In the east the army now holds more ground than it has for a decade. With 25,000 soldiers around Batticaloa, it is trying to drive an estimated 500 Tigers from their last two eastern hideouts, in thick jungle to the north-west and south-west of the town. General Fonseka says this will be done within two weeks. Yet whether the army can retain its ground as the refugees return, with Tigers hiding among them, is uncertain. Either way, it would be wrong to call this campaign a military triumph. It owes more to the defection in 2004 of the Tigers' eastern commander, Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan, who is known as Colonel Karuna.

Compliant in the way of other militias, Colonel Karuna demobilised 5,000-6,000 Tiger fighters ahead of the army's advance. He has since recruited a fresh militia, including, says the UN, over 200 children. This mob, which itself split last month, is being used by the government in time-honoured fashion: for intelligence, to rile the Tigers and to murder its opponents. The government, of course, denies this.

The north is a different case. As Colonel Karuna's defection suggests, the Tigers' grip on the east was always loose. The eastern population includes many Muslims and Sinhalese, and eastern Tamils consider themselves different from—and speak a different dialect to—the Jaffna Tamils who dominate the Tigers. In the north, however, Mr Prabhakaran runs a de facto state, with its own police force, justice system and tax regime. Penetrating the minefields and fortified trenches that encircle it, as the army has several times tried, would be bloody and perhaps impossible. Indeed, the Tigers' attack near Omanthai was retaliation for the army's latest half-dozen failed attempts. The government denies it; but a joint Norwegian-Icelandic monitoring mission says that around 200 soldiers were involved in each of these attacks, which were also near Omanthai. Up to a third of them were killed.

Ships and boats and planes

This is another oddity of Sri Lanka's war: the many-times proven ability of 10,000 self-trained guerrillas to defeat the government's 250,000 armed forces in conventional battles. A shimmering example of this is the Tigers' latest weapons system: a fleet of ten light aircraft, imported in pieces during the ceasefire and unveiled in two recent bombing raids on Colombo. One night in April, as the capital's air defences blazed wildly into the night sky, the flying Tigers dropped bombs on a gas installation and an air force base. The Czech-made planes are believed to have a top speed of 260kph. To shoot them down, the government is negotiating to buy five Russian MIG-29s, capable of a speed of 2,400kph. A top official suggested it would do better to buy a couple of second-world-war British Spitfires.

A main reason for the Tigers' success is their support base: a loyal and prosperous Tamil diaspora in America, Canada, Britain and Australia. Around 700,000 refugees from the current conflict are among them. The Tigers tax these exiles. Involvement in criminal schemes, notably credit-card fraud, also provides cash to buy arms. To bring in the guns, bought from South-East Asian arms dealers, the group has a merchant fleet of ten ocean-going vessels. In recent months the government claims to have sunk three of these ships, laden with guns bought in Indonesia. It seems, however, that these were different vessels, chartered for the task.

Whatever General Fonseka is planning, a military end to the war looks impossible. A pity, then, that Mr Rajapakse looks so incapable of peacemaking. He won election in November 2005 in part by promising the Sinhalese masses a less conciliatory approach to the Tigers than that shown by his opponent, Ranil Wickremesinghe, a former prime minister. By agreeing to a ceasefire, which recognised the Tigers' control of the north, Mr Wickremesinghe had riled many Sinhalese nationalists.

Those nationalists—led by a bigoted Buddhist clergy, whose small but shrill political party shares power with Mr Rajapakse's Sri Lanka Freedom Party—considered the ceasefire a precursor to splitting the country. Since in their view the Sinhalese are the sole owners of Sri Lanka, and all minorities are alien to it, this was unacceptable. Though the monks' orange-robed parliamentary leader, the Venerable Athuraliye Rathana, wants peace for most sentient beings, Tamil rebels are clearly excluded. “Day by day we are weakening them with our military force,” he says. “Talk can come later.”

The second secret to Mr Rajapakse's election was that, at the Tigers' command, north-eastern Tamils did not vote. Had they done so, most would have plumped for Mr Wickremesinghe, whose peacemaking delivered freedoms to travel and trade that they had not enjoyed in decades. This had represented a challenge to Mr Prabhakaran. Autocratic to his fingertips, incapable of sharing power even with trusted deputies such as Colonel Karuna, he wanted out of the peace process.

Mr Prabhakaran declared the election a Sinhalese affair, not for independence-seeking Tamils. A Sinhalese-chauvinist government suits Mr Prabhakaran, helping bolster Tamil support for the Tigers. Recent reports have even suggested that he struck a secret deal with the opportunistic Mr Rajapakse. In return for, in effect, delivering Mr Rajapakse to power, Mr Prabhakaran was promised cash, Colonel Karuna in chains and recognition of the Tigers' control of the east. Yet no sooner was Mr Rajapakse elected than both sides were shelling and murdering each other. Within six months, the war was back on.

Or rather, it had reverted to a different phase of what many Sri Lankans see as an endless cycle. On the government side, Mr Rajapakse's pledge to get tough on the Tigers has been heard from previous Sinhalese populists. Among southern Sinhalese this message is effective. In their pretty fishing villages and state-subsidised paddy-fields, most are too removed from the war to feel much urgency to end it. According to a poll in February by the Centre for Policy Alternatives, a Sri Lankan think-tank, 59% of Sinhalese wanted a “military solution” to the conflict. Mr Wickremesinghe's predecessor, President Chandrika Kumaratunga, had also tried to please this majority. She waged a policy of “war for peace” against the Tigers—as unsuccessful as it was illogical.

But Mr Rajapakse has plunged further into the past. Though the Tigers demand independence for the north-east, most Tamils would settle for a decent measure of autonomy. At the last round of peace talks, in Oslo in 2004, even the Tigers seemed to accept this; they issued a demand for “internal self-determination”. Mr Rajapakse, however, has proposed as his solution a modest devolution at the village level. This idea, modelled on India's system of Panchayats, was aired, and discredited, in the early 1980s.

What Tamils want

It is hard to exaggerate how inadequate, and depressing, most Tamils considered this. Yet Mr Rajapakse perhaps need not care. He remains popular, and not only for waging war. Mr Wickremesinghe made himself unpopular by introducing liberal economic reforms. By cutting a ruinous subsidy on paddy fertiliser, for example, he lost the votes of many peasant farmers. Among other populist measures, Mr Rajapakse has restored the subsidy. He has also tightened his grip in even less admirable ways.

Wary of political allies, Mr Rajapakse has appointed his three brothers to run important ministries. He has nabbed the ministries of finance, defence and public works for himself. Together, the brothers Rajapakse control over 70% of Sri Lanka's budget. The defence budget, which was increased by 40% this year, is being overseen by the unelected Gotabhaya Rajapakse. A former fire-eating army officer who spent 17 years in America, at one time managing a 7-Eleven store, Mr Rajapakse has proved as bellicose as Mr Prabhakaran and General Fonseka combined.

The government's profligacy and misrule is taking a toll. To sustain public expenditure, the governor of the central bank, another crony of Mr Rajapakse, has printed lots of new money. This has helped drive inflation to around 15%. Collapsing tourist revenues after the Tigers' blitz on Colombo augur more economic damage. Yet Mr Rajapakse may gamble that, with annual remittances of $2.5 billion from Sri Lankans working in the Middle East, the economy can ride this out. And he would probably be right.

All of which is good news for the appalling Mr Prabhakaran. Justified by the war, he has re-mobilised the north-east, demanding up to two child fighters from each family. War has also increased his opportunities to throttle dissent. Given little to hope for by the government, even Tamil moderates, who have no reason to love Mr Prabhakaran, are more likely to support, or at least suffer, him. “The Sinhalese authorities are not willing to talk to moderates,” says Suresh Premachandran, a parliamentary member of the Tamil National Alliance, who has several times escaped assassination attempts by the Tigers. “They only understand the LTTE.”

What could break the cycle? It is rather hard to imagine. As in other ethnic conflicts, from Palestine to Northern Ireland, the solution to Sri Lanka's conflict seems obvious. Tamils require an end to the discrimination that has virtually barred them from holding jobs in the army and police. After so long a struggle, they also require a fair apportioning of power to a united north-eastern province. Nothing less will bind them to Sri Lanka and diminish Mr Prabhakaran's brutish hold over them.

For their part, the Sinhalese need to understand that this is so. Mr Wickremesinghe, an uncharismatic sort, had the right vision but failed to sell it. If Mr Rajapakse were wiser than he is, he might have done better. But the current prospects for rallying the Sinhalese behind an accommodation with the Tigers appear little better than hopeless.

Supposing Mr Rajapakse even wanted this, he would need to shed his nationalist allies and seek an alliance with Mr Wickremesinghe's United National Party (UNP)—though the UNP, a score of whose MPs Mr Rajapakse has co-opted into his coalition, would probably have none of this. If Sri Lanka is to have peace, it may not be under Mr Rajapakse. And it may not be soon, with no general election due in Sri Lanka until 2010.

Making Tea, Honour Killing or Suicide?

2007-06-08T22:01:00.001+05:30

Don't know where to begin but a couple weeks ago Susila, a young Tamil woman who comes to clean at the house, told me that her 'sister' had been in a terrible fire. Apparently, she had been making tea when some chemical was nearby and erupted in the gas-fed stove. She left gruesome photos of her sister in hospital, charred face and bandaged body. On Tuesday I talked with her over the phone to ask why she could not come to work this past week. She informed me that her sister had come home from the hospital so she was being with her family and providing care services. My ex-flatmate, who introduced me to her, also discussed with her on Monday about her absence at work. She had told us that we could visit her sister at the house later this week. Apparently, my Jaffna-born, London-bred ex-flatmate confused verbs in Tamil.

On Thursday I bought an exotic bouquet of wild purple orchids and planned to convene with my ex-flatmate and current Swedish flatmate in order to troop down to her house. Susila and family live in a good section of town, Cinnamon Gardens, but it is in cramped settlements. Her tiny 2-story, loft house is buried within a maze of other similar settlements, not quite a tenament, not quite a shanty. My ex-flatmate noted that they seem to be middle class. My ex-flatmate just got a Volkswagon Beetle, late 60s model which is vanilla coloured. Since he didn;t know the way he followed me in my regular three-wheeler, Zulfi's, tuk tuk. Upon arriving to her house, across from a decadent kovil, or Hindu temple, there was a massive funeral procession, with followers clad in white saris and kortas. Zulfi frankly exclaimed, "he's just died?! are we late?" (he and she are used interchangeably in many South Asian languages). The Swede and I burst out laughing in disbelief. It looked like a Buddhist funeral and Susila is Hindu. I realise now that Buddhist, Hindu and Christian funerals are very similar in Sri Lanka, only Muslim ones differ. The coffin with the charred young woman of 20, Rosemary, was carried down the road to the next door cemetary with the whole neighbourhood following. Zulfi managed to find the pint-sized Susila with huge dewey eyes in the crowd. All I could do was embrace her and explode with anger and grief, breaking into hysteria. It is contagious, when you are around so much emotion. My flatmates were completely numb and awestruck. The irony was too heavy to know what to do. We expected to be going to see Susila's sister recover, only to come to a full-on spectacle of grief. They sort of glumly looked at the ground, shuffling feet...I just tried whatever I could do to comfort this broken, already fragile young woman. It was earth shattering to hear her shrieking "Maaadam, whyyyyyyy?!! Why is she not here??!"

We followed Susila to the burial site, witnessing the hoopla - mothers, sisters, aunties throwing themselves on the body (which by then had been removed from the coffin and laid out on a wooden plank across the grave). The sobbing and wailing was nearly deafening! I tried to steady Susila and try to wrap my head around so much confusion. How did she get burned in the first place? Why weren't we directly told that she had died on Monday? What could we possible do for her? (Again, my ex-flatmate mixed up the two verbs in Tamil that mean to die - he didn't understand the verb that Susila had used. In conversations with both of us it was said that she had come home from the hospital, meaning the body had come). Everything had fallen away, watching someone's entire world shatter before me. I have no idea why she invited us hillbillies to something so solemn and personal. But it was clear that she wanted us there and appreciated our sympathy.

Not knowing the protocol for Sri Lankan funerals the three of us just stood around trying not to get in people's ways. After the performance of people trying to throw themselves on the body, and the subsequent near riot of relatives trying to calm others down, Susila invited me up to see the dead girl. You are supposed to put fragrant oil on the body and send it to the next world or next life with your wishes. Comically, I squatted down to get close to her, but I stepped on the back of my skirt. Then people said I should put the oil on her so I stood up only for my skirt to yank down, exposing my white ass! While trying to pour oil and hike up my skirt, my foot slipped down under the plank, the soft earth near sucking me into the open grave. All the while a cool breeze moving across my bum! Where's the video camera when you need one? It may remain as one of my most scarring memories, though, nearly being sucked down by the underworld, with the still body lying starkly above, swaddled in white dress and garlands, her scorched hands hidden in white, gauze gloves, her melted, charred face pancaked with makeup and covered by transparent gauze. Luckily people grabbed hold of me and I managed to embarassingly pull myself together.

When they started putting the exposed body into the ground and throwing dirt on her, most of the crowd lost it and another small riot nearly erupted. I learned later that at all funerals this is a ritual; the more wailing and chaos the more it is said that the person was loved. I found my flatmates in the crowd and in my chagrin we shuffled to the end of the funeral queue, in which we are supposed to press two hands together, bow heads and wish blessings or words of comfort. At the same time, out of the corner of my eye, I see Zulfi who had pulled up outside the cemetary. Like some kind of jester, he is waving his hands frantically with a grin on his face. In the initial ironic moments we forgot to say anything to him and left him waiting. So we met with him to release him, all the while he has a comical grin on his face, chuckling to himself at our utter stupidity.

We went back to Susila's or Rosemary's house where the funeral party gathered to drink juice and nibble biscuits. Oddly, women were not allowed to immediately surround the open grave or get too close to the body (maybe so they don;t fall in?), but then are forced to host the gathering and make tea and the dinner. We didn;t stay long, only to look at the glittered photo album of Rosemary's coming of age shindig and to try to get some of our burning questions answered. There are so many dodgy, puzzling aspects related to her death. First, Rosemary is not Susila's sister, but a cousin - in Tamil, they call cousins 'sisters/brothers' as it relates to patri or matrilineal descendents. I think on your father's side you can marry cousins, on your mother's side you cannot. Then, it was strange to see Susila's family more worked up about the death than Rosemary's immediate family. It is also weird that Rosemary supposedly threw turpentine into the flame while making tea. Sri Lanka has the highest rate of suicide in the world, apparently, and the most common forms of suicide are by hanging or by setting oneself on fire. So it is highly possible that she attempted suicide and the family politely tries to hide it, by calling it an accident, rather than dishonour the family.

However, there have also been cases of honour killing in Sri Lanka, even though the practice is more common in India and Bangladesh. When a woman is perceived of wrongdoing, such as looking at a married man, having love affair(s), having a child out of wedlock, essentially anything that a family perceives as dishonouring them, some form of hideous torture is inflicted on her. This can also be the case if a woman rejects a man;s advances. In Bangladesh it is a widespread practice to throw acid on the woman; in India they may be beaten or stoned to death or set on fire. It is unclear if there were any associated ill motives with Rosemary's tragic death. But there are too many discrepancies in the story and no one is telling the full details. Or perhaps it is another case of structural violence. If it was suicide perhaps this incredibly repressive, violent country with its little recognition for Tamils' human rights drove her to it. Or perhaps she had been waiting 3 weeks in the government run hospital with little or no sufficient treatment. After all in this country she is seen as just another beastly Tamil, in which case maybe she is better off dead...

...In other news, the bloody President has started to expel 'undesirable' Tamils from Colombo, sending them to the conflict-distraught North and East. Although a number of these families, who operate restaurants, hotels, shops, have lived in Colombo for decades they are forcibly removed and relocated to live in internally displaced peoples' (goddamit they are refugees! where is their state?) camps. It is a revolting, sobering policy that taps into how illogical this government and its profiteering, genocidal President is. Tamils have no rights here, no state, but are forced into territory as if the government is 'helping' them. As if sending them to a constantly redefined part of the country would lead to a new Tamil state, as if expelling Tamils would make Colombo safer. I am mortified more from the bumbling, irrational, right-wing, nationalist Singhalese.

***********************If there is a Sri Lankan embassy in your country, contact them or your government to say you disapprove of the ethnic cleansing that is taking place.

Thai AIDS patients suffer as drug squabble drags on

2007-05-24T09:51:00.001+05:30

By Darren Schuettler

BANGKOK, May 22 (Reuters) - Each morning, Somying
waits on the canal near her Bangkok slum for the
iceboat that has become her lifeline.

"It's expensive but I need ice every day," the
33-year-old said of the 12 baht ($0.37) purchase that
keeps her lifesaving AIDS drug, Kaletra, from
perishing in hot season temperatures nearing 40
degrees centigrade (104 F)

A version that does not need refrigeration is
available in the United States, but not in Thailand
where the army-backed government is embroiled in a
patent dispute with its maker, U.S. pharmaceutical
giant Abbott Laboratories.

Abbott will not register the new version, Aluvia,
until Bangkok renounces its January decision to invoke
a compulsory licence under world trade rules which
allow governments to make or buy copycat versions of
drugs for public health measures.

Thailand, which has taken similar action on another
AIDS drug and a heart disease medicine in what it says
is a bid to widen access for its poor, wants Abbott to
cut its prices more.

The company is sticking to its last offer of $1,000
per patient a year, down from $2,200, but higher than
generic versions.

"The new pills would make it easier," said Somying,
whose monthly ice bill eats up nearly half the 800
baht she earns at home tying ribbons for a garland
maker.

"I wouldn't have to buy ice or carry around the cooler
anymore," she said outside the two-room shack she
shares with her two children, including a 13-year-old
son with AIDS.

Still, they are among the lucky ones.

WAITING FOR TREATMENT

Of the 8,000 Thais who need Kaletra, a so-called
second-line drug for people who develop resistance to
initial treatment, only 600 are receiving the drug --
and the older version at that.

Somying, who was forced to leave her cleaning job at a
sausage factory due to AIDS-related illnesses, still
pays 500 baht a month into an employee health plan to
receive Kaletra.

Without charitable donations, Somying, who lost her
husband to AIDS a decade ago, said her family would
not survive.

Her son, back in school six years after he walked out
when teachers tried to keep him away from other
children, receives the drug through the national
health scheme, which covers 80 percent of Thailand's
63 million people.

A former AIDS hotspot, Thailand has won praise for
reducing infections and expanding drug treatment to
100,000 of the 580,000 Thais living with AIDS. But it
now faces budget pressures as more people need
treatment, including expensive second-line drugs.

Somsit Tansuphaswadikul, a doctor at Bangkok's main
infectious disease hospital, said he has 30 patients
on Kaletra but could treat 70 more.

"There is a quota for second-line patients because of
the budget. Some patients may not get access because
it's not available, so they keep on with the old
regimen," he said.

The drug industry's defenders say Thailand, which is
spending $100 million on HIV-AIDS programmes this
year, is a middle-income nation that can afford higher
drug prices.

Bangkok says health care is already its second biggest
budget item after education, but it is worried about
the impact on trade relations with its major partner,
the United States.

"AXIS OF IP EVIL"

Health Minister Mongkol na Songkhla is in Washington
this week to meet trade officials who put Thailand on
a "priority watch list", citing a "weakening of
respect for patents" which could open the country to
trade retaliation.

"We only want access to drugs for people who have no
access.

We can't let them down," Mongkol told Reuters before
the trip he said was aimed at countering "bad
information" about his policy.

Mongkol, who acted after a coup ousted pro-business
Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra last year, said he
may target two more drugs, not the 20-30 some reports
have cited.

Mongkol has won support from health groups such as
Doctors Without Borders and former U.S. President Bill
Clinton, whose foundation brokers deals with generic
drug makers to provide lower-priced drugs for
developing nations.

"No company will live or die because of high price
premiums for AIDS drugs in middle-income countries,
but patients may,"

Clinton said in backing Thailand and Brazil, which has
followed Bangkok in overriding the patent on
Efavirenz, an AIDS drug made by U.S.-based Merck & Co
Inc.

Washington has urged the Thais and drug firms to
negotiate.

Its envoy in Bangkok has also criticised a campaign
waged by the lobby group USA for Innovation, which has
indirect links to the drug industry. It accuses
Bangkok of stealing American intellectual property for
military benefit and forming part of an "axis of IP
evil".

Thailand plans to hire a U.S. public relations firm to
counter the attacks, but some say the slanging match
should be replaced by a serious multilateral debate on
how to provide affordable medicines to the world's
poor.

"Drugs are not a tape or CD or something like that. We
need to think about the human right to receive
treatment. It's the same all over the world," Somsit
said.

Abduction of UN personnel in Sri Lanka

2007-05-22T10:55:00.000+05:30

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama on Monday expressed to a United Nations official the Government's concern about the abduction and detention of two U.N. staff members by the LTTE in February.

The Acting U.N. Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator and Representative and Resident Director of the World Food Programme, Jeff Taft Dick, was summoned to the Foreign Ministry in this regard. The Minister told Mr. Dick that the "failure" on the part of the U.N. to bring this matter to the notice of the Foreign Ministry until April 27 was "unacceptable".

Mr. Bogollagama maintained that the "failure" of the U.N. Office in Sri Lanka made it difficult for the Government to discharge its obligations under the 1994 U.N. Convention on the Safety of the U.N. and Associated Personnel, to which Sri Lanka is a party.

At a news conference here, the Minister said that Sri Lanka was surprised to note that the abduction and detention of these persons had not been brought to the notice of the U.N. Secretary-General, judging by statements made by the Secretary-General's spokesperson in New York on April 20.

The Minister, who noted that the Government was also concerned by the reference in the U.N. statement to this `abduction' as an `arrest', said the circumstances relating to this incident could be perceived as an attempt by the U.N. authorities in Sri Lanka to shield the LTTE's criminal actions.

The Minister said that since the continued abduction of one of the U.N. staff was officially reported to the Government on April 27, the authorities concerned would proceed to take action in this matter.

Mr. Dick told the Minister that of the two staff members, one had already been released and that S.P. Thamilchelvan, head of the political wing of the LTTE, had agreed that the matter relating to the other would be reviewed further.

To inform U.N.

He reportedly told the Minister that the use of terminology of `arrest' was a mistake, and that the United Nations classified this as abduction. He said that he would convey the concerns of the Sri Lanka Government to the United Nations.

The military said that a soldier was injured when the LTTE cadres opened fire at a group of army soldiers at Neelapola in Trincomalee on Monday evening. The attack took place around 7.15 p.m. as the Army was conducting a foot patrol in the area.

In another incident, troops conducting clearing operations in the Pankulam area in Trincomalee, found stocks of ammunition. They included ammunition for 12.7mm machine guns, multi-purpose machine guns and T-56 rifles.

The military further reported that in Jaffna, civilians continue their cooperation with the Sri Lanka security forces by providing valuable information on hidden terror arms in the area.

pride in colombo

2007-05-21T22:48:00.000+05:30

it's hard to imagine that a place as lovely, complex, diverse and friendly as sri lanka has banned homosexuality and queer spirits. the laws still prohibit people from being open about their Lesbian-Gay-Bisexual-Transgendered-Queer (LGBTQ - did i cover most non-hetero sexualities?) sexuality, to the point of intimidation, humiliation, harassment, even imprisonment and torture. while the country promotes tourism and does little about the rampant prostitution, sex trade, paedophilia and human trafficking it seizes LGBTQ people from the lives they should lead, depriving them of essential human rights. for instance in the mid-1990s a lesbian conference here was shut down with participants being socially persecuted, even subjected to death threats. it's not an isolated incident but occurs quite often throughout asia and the developing South. it seems countries which preach uber-masculinity and patriarchy, a system with impossible ideals, stereotypes, practices and networks of power, is most conducive to threatening and masking people who live as multiply gendered. what is this lunatic normative system? how and why does this system prevail? how and why does it coincide with systems of violence, and why are the historically most violent countries, particulary in this region (afghanistan, bhutan, china, fiji, indonesia, iran, nepal, pakistan, samoa, to name a few), also the most irrational and unaccepting of LGBTQ sexualities?

perhaps people who are seen as outside the mainstream, just through their existence, question and rupture the very foundations of what is the staus quo, what is pushed as 'normal', what derives itself from the subjugation of a select, special group of people. it is the same seething system and political process that attempts to control men and women's bodies and minds, to put them into dichotomous categories, to blame the victim, and to maintain the administration of haves and have nots. it is the same system whereby women are seen as property, only as baby-producing machines who can then clean up after she is raped and tortured. if people were freer to live their lives in ways that do not hurt anyone or themselves i guess it would create too much compassion, happiness, tolerance, diversity and overall wellbeing...no? i cannot understand any partiarchal-hetero-ethnocentric system that perpetuates and thrives on the unhappiness and torment of any group of people, seen as a minority, deemed as outcasts and threats to 'morality'. how we define these values is completely subjective not to mention utterly irrelevant when we live in an age of accelerated globalisation and exchange of ideas/information/cusoms. how are we supposed to move ahead and get past differences in order to achieve full on human rights and wellbeing enhancement? eh?

this week is pride week in sri lanka (mainly with events in colombo), which celebrates when the World Health Organisation removed homosexuality as a defined mental disorder and which highlights the living experiences of LGBTQ people. not many people have come out in sri lanka, even friends who are gay do not come out to everyone, not even to their family. as a straight person living, working, breathing, existing among many different people, i can support the cause to abolish ignorance on LGBTQ issues. it is an area where even human rights advocates with whom i work, do not even address the rights of LGBTQ nor sex workers nor people living with HIV. it;s a complete paradox to separate causes like that when one should be working to achieve humanism in a holistic manner.

one film i saw during the pride extravaganza, 'dangerous lives: coming out in the developing world', narrated by janeane garofolo, addressed the volatility and discrimination for LGBTQ people in the south. one shocking case, that i remember amnesty international and other human rights groups worked on around the turn of the millennium, was the cairo 52. cairo had become a gay mecca in recent times, like a bangkok, miami, kuala lumpur, but faced a massive legislative crackdown on gay culture, classifying LGBTQ, particularly men, as sodomists and sons of the devil. it is extremely difficult to experience queer life in muslim countries because it is seen as religious blasphemy, going against god's will, jilting the status quo. in this case, police cracked down on a queer nile river cruise, arresting 52 guys and subjecting them to unjustifed detainment, lack of access to legal resources, corrupt trials, abusive and squalid imprisonment for several years, immense torture and other injustices. after LGBTQ activists from around the world erupted a large scale campaign, the imprisoned were eventually liberated. an odd thing is that, with all the gay activists in the US lobbying, the liberation came after the US senate bullied egypt and threatened economic or trade barriers (and prevented the sale of its weapons to egypt, which goes to fight the kinds of people that US wanted to liberate) due to their violation of human rights. so is the arms and free trade, with such political and economic leverage, actually beneficial to gay people in developing countries? still trying to wrap my head around this one.

despite being freed from prison, the GTBQ guys were still subjected to discrimination, threats and harassment in their daily lives, forcing them to closet their existence. many of the 52 were able to seek political asylum in the north, and although they could connect with gay communities there they were forced into exile and to be away from the people and countries they love. in other circumstances, such as in sri lanka, lesbians are often thought to be mentally unstable and that they can be 'cured'. there are numerous cases around the world (e.g. colombia) where lesbians have been raped, tortured and killed by police and armed forces, with their families also subjected to violence, with the belief that men can fuck the lesbianism out of them. they are seen as contrary to what hetero men believe to be about women, that they should be made inferior and under their control. a lesbian with a happy partner, child, family and friends is a more powerful person who does not need the utility of men, who can manage their lives based on functionality better than how the status quo dictates. truly saddening and unfathomable. wot more can we do to eradicate these brutal hierarchies? who determines what is fair, just, moral, 'norml'?

one unfortunate aspect that is not discussed enough within this movement, at least from the developing countries' perspectives, is HIV and AIDS. sex and sexuality remain taboo subjects in the much of the south, so the promotion of safe sex and preventative methods against spreading HIV is generally absent from discussion and advocacy. you do see some HIV discussion within LGBTQ movements but most people in sri lanka, for instance, do not address the health concerns of this sexually and fluids-transmitting virus. LGBTQ and HIV do not necessarily go hand in hand, but there is so much misconception and ignorance about both and when talking about one it is important to raise the other. for instance, in another documentary about male sex workers in india, i suppose because the nature of their work and the taboo of being GBTQ, most sex workers do not think or discuss about HIV. some men are not tested, despite the proactive measures to make affordable testing available. many sex workers have wives, children, families to support and do not want their families to know about their work. so they may face stigma in getting tested. many sex workers think that HIV is only a disease from westerners, the poor, or that if they get HIV it is god's will/karma. or they think that if they only sleep with rich or upper caste men they will not get it. there are so many myths that these sex workers believe or follow in order to convince themselves that their means of work and economic prospects are not dangerous, wrong or risky. it may be easier to believe they are impervious because they are already crusading for awareness about homosexuality. but it can be seen as a falseity if you are open to yourself about one aspect of your sexuality by masking other risky, underground aspects, such as the vulnerability to HIV. again, it seems to be that it would disrupt their way of existence and job prospects, their means of survival. a really devastating, contradictory tragedy.

so i guess one way to bridge these two issues more successfully in the developing south would be to tackle the stigma permeating from religious and zealous nationalistic beliefs. in many cases throughout african countries and india HIV educators have used depictions from religion and spiritual cosmologies to get the point across about how to protect oneself from HIV and STI by using condoms and by being cautious about sexual encounters. by bringing up issues related to sexuality, that it is not just a tool for procreation, and getting people talking about sex more openly (in a non-exploitative, non-objectifying way) it can close the gap of ignorance to a better informed, healthy, happy, sexually satiated public. praps. in addition, people need to get off their arse and become activated on human rights and social justice causes!!! even if it just means writing a letter or calling your respectful bastard parliamentarian.

louder than bombs

2007-04-29T17:54:00.000+05:30

hey

there are power shortages so i want to get across a few things, frantically and as fast as i can, in the distance i can hear the practicing of SL forces for its missile attacks; my house is shaking; there is curfew:

no, things have worsened. long story, but i went to watch the cricket match world cup final at a big cricket grounds last nite, which was mad in itself. luck and intuition made me leave right at half-time around 130am. when my flatmate, her beau who is visiting since yesterday from sweden, and i went back to our flat to find the power cut off. then the bombing started. ltte now has over 5 aircrafts with good pilots who bombed the main fuel station supplier (near the international airport), parts of the international airport, the harbour and some other areas in colombo. so fighting has started in colombo. about 2 weeks ago the bombing took place 8km from the international airport, so my friends who arrived/departed were ok, but shaken up.

now in SL there is very weak surveillance and military strategy. so after these mysterious attacks, during the match when the whole country was watching cricket, crowdedly gathered, the confused SL forces shot back into complete darkness...so they were firing at anything, often hitting buildings, residences, businesses in colombo, alot of 'collateral damage'. i dont think anyone was hurt or killed. it looked like fireworks. but the first time i heard bombs right in my sweet little neighbourhood in Colpetty.

there were 2 main attacks by ltte, from 130-140 am, then again at 330am or so. the counter attacks by SL forces went on until 5am. i was receiving security calls and calls from friends (luckily cell phone working during this time - even tho they are dastardly evil machines) all through the nite. we are all tired and distraught, but coping and relatively safe, showered by rain this sunday not bombs. we are not sure what will happen next. most likely there will not be another attack for at least a week, as tigers have to prepare. but there is a curfew and i cannot go long distances.

i have been hanging out most of the day, drinking tea, arrack (a coconut whisky) and smoking fiendishly with my greek friend in his guesthouse garden. he is one of the lucky few who will leave this country on thurs. so sad to see a good friend leave - even tho he's only been here a few months...the president of this fukt up country and 70 parliament ministers have rightfully fukt off but done so by using state funds to go on an excursion to support the cricket team in barbados. i hope he is having a nice time drinking coconut rum while his country is being bombed to bits. maybe he will suddenly mysteriously be disappeared or have committed suicide, like the pakistani cricket coach who was strangled after losing the match.

the priorities are fukt here. not sure what un will do and if we have to be evacuated. hard to say. hard to get any info from them. now it is the vesak holiday, where normally everyone celebrates "lord' buddha's birthday, day of enlightment, and deathdate. they decorate houses and streets with paper lanterns, give out free food, and have massive lit up billboards of plastic shaped buddhas. tacky is the thing for sri lanka, in all aspects of life. there are no political or surveillance strategies, only hideous cheeky teledramas, embarassing crotch grabbing and pissing into the wind with sarongs flapping. i was talking all day with some ex-pat sri lankans living in singapore who sell everything from solar panels to arms to aircrafts. their company has sold second hand helicopters and airplanes from soviet russia to SL govt, because govt wants it cheap. (whereas tigers are getting trained by thais and getting top notch crafts from pakistan, india etc who knows).

now the president, after losing the cricket match to Australia, is prolly pandering to US to get more funds and arms from them to blindly w.a.s.t.e. and shoot at anything here, including its own civilians. so the sri lankans in singapore were saying that they tried to warn the govt to invest in surveillance and intelligence technology, but govt does not want and says there is no need....yet they cannot even find the 3 planes that attacked last nite. it takes about 45 min to get back to the north to safely land so i dont know how they could not track these planes and cannot find tiger aircrafts nor runways. priorities are fukt. the govt knows what is going on and know more than what they are revealing, as usual, but costing and risking many people's lives. this is a sick game for them, a test of strength and brutal masculinity. on both sides. at least, thus far, the ltte has made very strategic targets, to bomb military bases, fuel and power stations, harbours etc, whereas the govt is blindly shooting at orphanages, internally displaced peoples, any civilians and they are even suspected of planting the bombs on buses (near vavuniya and hikkaduwa in previous months) in order to get more funding from the west in order to fight the so-called terrorism. no one remembers that the jvp party who has a stronghold in the govt parliament, was once a terrorist group massacring everyone suspected of not supporting them. and many sri lankans are too ignorant and daft to critically analyse the situtation. oddly, there was no mention of the attacks in the papers today nor on the news, only about sri lanka losing the world cup. for fuck sakes! so if it not printed in the media or on tv no one knows in the rest of the country. even tho most ppl in colombo felt it and saw it last nite. i am strangely tranquil and i will leave the country if my intuition, which is usually strong, tells me to leave. even my greek friend says that his ngo back in greece could help me find job to work in eco-tourism...so i am waiting to see what opportunities or circumstances arise. i do not feel too threatened yet, despite seeing shrapnel and bits from buildings falling into my lovely courtyard, under my lime tree which is dropping mad, massive limes. so no good news to report. it is a week long buddhist holiday, yet i have lots of work to do and keep busy. today is a day of reflection and attempt to make sense of what i am doing here.

let's see what happens these coming weeks/months. take care of yourselves. the world that we grew up with, its comforts and privilege has fallen apart. even water and power shortages are felt in the us. so we are slowly waking from our coccoons to a reality that is a nightmare in which we have already too much fukt up any plan for getting out of it. i wish i could be more optimistic. hope you and your families are safe. there is only a few more years left of oil so enjoy the commodities and conveniences that we have and keep spreading the word. missing you and hope to see you again very soon!

a bit of a ramble...but trying to take advantage of my access to internet/power. shit another bomb just went off as i post this....it feels like an earthquake or when a subway is about to arrive at a platform or when your intestines and bowels cut loose. not sure if this will turn into riots. cheers.

lots of love

b

Grand Palace Bangkok

2007-01-15T11:23:00.000+05:30

Peace Haven villa

2007-01-15T11:02:00.000+05:30

Some friends and I have found a villa that rents for $120/nite so with 8 people it is a very cheap place to stay. The best part is that the cook there can make anything, so long as we go with him to market to select the fish or vegetables. Very tranquil and perched on clifftop, overlooking the rough sea. We have to walk 10-mintues to get to a suitable swimmable bay but the walk takes us past natural blowholes, water buffalo, cow-herders, capsized boats, and tiny seaside shacks that sell toddy (moonshine made from coconuts). Well worth the long 6-hour drive on dusty, dodgy roads.

Tangalle

2007-01-15T10:49:00.000+05:30

What is unusual about Sri Lanka is how you wouldn’t actually think there was a war given the pockets of peace and lovely quiet towns. In Tangalle there are the liveliest markets, water buffaloes grazing on clifftops, and hypnotic, paradisical sunsets!

At the port some friends and I discussed with the fishermen about the day’s catches. It is definitely noticeable these past few months how the impact of the rising oil prices, inflation rates and devalued currency have affected the fishermen, saying that have to charge higher prices to cover the cost of fuel and other operational costs.

Down South 2 years after Tsunami

2007-01-15T10:38:00.000+05:30

Late last year I traveled south a couple times to Tangalle and Hikkaduwa, seaside towns known for the fish and surfing. It’s still strange to see the wreckage of the tsunami 2 years afterwards. Although many houses, hotels, businesses have been rebuilt, and most people have recovered from the onslaught of the ‘benevolence’ of NGOs, people enter into a new phase of recovery, from the decline in the tourist industry due to heightened conflict. Around the New Year a bus bomb exploded on the main road, a few km outside Hikkaduwa, killing about 15 people. Tourism has dropped significantly and the rupee has devalued, putting pressure on everyone. This is the same pressure that people in the East and North have felt, probably for the last 23 years; only it is even more unbearable to think that very little has been done to reconstruct the communities hit by the tsunami, due to the constant gunfire and slaughter.

Claymore mine in Wellawatte

2006-10-04T20:09:00.000+05:30

a claymore mine was planted in wellawatte, my old neighbourhood, at the end of my old street, hidden in refuse. it wasnt detonated and no one was hurt. it is suspected to be aimed at a passing train on the seaside train tracks. numerous wealthy tamil businessmen have been kidnappped this month as well, with speculations that they support the tigers. it may be the karuna faction behind these abductions. however, karuna faction (a rival guerilla group from tigers - somewhat in cahoots with GoSL) is nearly defunct, so it is suspicious about who is behind these kidnappings. it seems like GoSL forces are defeating ltte forces in jaffna area by way of killing more civilians. then there are reports that tiger affiliates in london are knocking on tamils' doors asking for 2000 quid per household to support tigers. they obtained residents' info through the election registration, apparently. but media is wild and it's difficult to get all the stories.

our peace demo in main roundabout in colombo was cancelled today cos jvp and jhu suppporters took to the streets to protest the norwegians (claiming that they are partnering with ltte - even tho they are just facilitating peace talks and invited by the government at the time of the ceasefire agreement) and protesting all ngos (claiming that any humanitarian assistance in the north and east is going to support the tigers and division of the state). all a bit mad.

check out:
tamilnet.com

underground tunnels in Saudi built by the newest forms of slavery

2006-10-03T23:41:00.000+05:30

managed to participate in 5K peace run the other day, initially aimed for 10 but didnt last for the whole thing. i am useless compared to the other participants, most under the age of 20 who managed to run 21K, all barefoot on the steaming broken asphalt of colombo. absolutely incredible to see these children run that long. we'll have to keep running, shouting, cheering, cartwheeling for peace in sri lanka, and prolly for a long time to come, in terms of attaining a sustainable process.

i've also been speaking alot lately with former migrants who went to the middle east to work. they are back, some drive three-wheelers, some own small businesses like corner shops or shalwar boutiques, some are in IT. a confluence of issues send them in search of work, namely to find opportunities that were diminished here due to the conflict, to save money to return to their familiies or to start a small business back in SL, or due to poor recruitment or trafficking. the middle east is the most common destination for SL migrants, about 50% are women who go there to work as domestic helpers, in nursing homes or nurses. after the phase out of the Agreement on Textile and Clothing, about 120,000 retrenched workers went abroad, most likely to the middle east. in the case of the men migrants i;ve run into or spoken to recently, they go to work as hard labourers in saudi arabia, bahrain, kuwait. they find jobs in construction, mining, oil rigging etc. they have said that awhile ago (1980s) they used to go to iraq and kuwait to help with underground construction, now it seems they are sent to the insanely rich, untouchable, unaccountable kingdoms of saudi arabia, jordan, dubai...

some interesting overlap has become more apparent with their stories. several of these former migrants have discussed that they were working on building massive underground tunnels in the Saudi Arabian deserts, the size of superhighways. some were located fairly close (maybe 20km) to oil pipelines, but these tunnels ultimately connect all over the country, potentially connecting across the middle east one day. these tunnels have the potential to house planes, missiles, housing/bunkers, storage, various kinds of infrastructural needs. some workers have said that many of these internal structures already exist. it's easy to be skeptical. then they say that the industry often hires the cheap, (initially) non-english speaking labourers because no one will really talk about it or question the work, just do the job for a short time then leave. some say that managers, engineers and other designers are from the North (finland, norway, sweden). one family man i know quite well had been there for several years, worked in various positions including in an office part. they always checked to make sure that the workers did not take any documentation out of the workplace. often these unknown, vague corporate entities prefer to hire sri lankans because as one former migrant says, they do not eat all the time, or not as much as filipinos or bangladeshis. maybe it's a running joke.

again, it is easy to be skeptical. but it is also hard to ignore the possibility that countries that are outside the radar, in terms of weapons-inspections or any kind of accountability, recruit cheap labour to build their grids and star wars empires. what could all this construction be for other than the smooth access of immediate crude oil to satiate the 40% of total consumption by the world's militaries? what could we possibly need all this oil for other than to put into research and designing the world's most dangerous weaponry to be used in the most unconscionable destruction of humanity?...should the time come. what better way to characterize the perpetuation and existence of poverty than the idea that people made poor by crap international financial loans, conflicts, natural disasters, preventable disease and deprivation by the North, are sent abroad as labourers, furthering their economic dependence on this new form of slavery, in order to service the unfathomably rich, as part of their scheme to safeguard themselves against other rich kingdoms (also rotten with obese filthy scoundrels), by creating massive labyrinths crammed with anti-humanity killing machines???! this notion, fragmented and scotch-taped together by a number of former migrants, of the same ethnicity and background, makes these spossedly 'new' international torture chambers look like playgrounds.

Aku

2006-09-27T22:50:00.000+05:30

Aku by Chairil Anwar (famous Minangkabau poet - indigenous group in West Sumatra, Indonesia, which are the largest matrilineal society in the world)

If my time should come
I'd like no one to entice me.
Not even you.
No need for those sobs and cries.

I am but a wild animal
Cut from its kind.

Though bullets should pierce my skin
I shall still strike and march forth.
Wounds and poison shall I take aflee. Aflee
'Til the pain and pang should disappear.

And I should care even less.

I want to live
for another thousand years.

Serious grievances

2006-09-18T08:16:00.000+05:30

Its shocking when you work for an international organisation that works for human development and come to find out that it is full of inept, misguided, harassing lunatics. I mean, the majority of these people do not know how to relate to people within the office, on a humanist level, much less people on the street. In the process they use the hierarchies within this organisation to compete, climb over people, backstab, maliciously gossip and generally treat people like budawa manure. Management is comprised of a couple of weirdos who do not care about the people or programmes they are spossed to be managing. The Number 1 is a languid, airheaded, lacking substance womanizer who plays ambient music in his post-modern furnished office, and cannot even answer basic questions about human development or MDGs. The Number 2, soon to be transferred to Bangladesh - god help the country - walks around with a puffed up chest, wears glasses like Austin Powers and sports pink shirts. All the while he cannot make decisions and blocks the efficient processes in implementing our programmes. At this rate of administration and hurdles, due to bad management (with managers hired on a nespotic basis), countries in Asia-Pacific will not attain Millennium Development Goals by 2015, most likely 2200 - to be generous.

That brings me to the latest flavour of the development world: the Integrated Package of Services, or the costing of MDG attainment in counties. Its the newest version of Structural Adjustment Programmes, where a number of international organisations, revamping neoliberal private sector mentality, try to restructure governments so that they take priority to achieve the MDGs, without looking at the very particular context of each country. Essentially, this latest programme attempts to impose a macro-economic model, still at its very conceptual and abstract stage, on a country that may not have the technical capacity or fiscal ability to adopt such a model. As I see it, each agency has to come up with priorities of which MDGs it can meet by 2015 and how it will cost the government to do so. Of course, it is not the responsibility of just the government to carry human development objectives forward, it has been launched by (in)formal civil society and collectives.

Loads of development money is funnelled into this programme, but it could likely fail given its poor management and top-down construction, probably developed by the top men economists in the world. If more women or feminist economics were consulted on its design and implementation, it may be more open to accepting feedback from people living in poverty - in a way that asks people what they except from donors or development community, how these international so-called experts can work on their immediate behalf. (For starters, maybe these folks can give up a fraction of their ridiculous salaries and business class treatment - unless there is a dire health or well-being complication, such as special healthcare for staff living with HIV). Its an extremely political programme, with staff getting lauded for their so-called good work on rolling out the implementation of this MDG costing in its 4 pilot countries. Yet these countries (Afghanistan, Bhutan, Mongolia, Pakistan) have not been a success. Afghanistan has fallen apart as any kind of state with the obvious occupation of US and other imperial governments. Bhutan has its own indicators (Gross National Happiness) on measuring and financing human development objectives. Pakistan has met obstacles because leaders in several international organisations have objected to the paradigm of the MDGs, saying that they are not fully inclusive and have been devised in a top-down way. Mongolia is one country that may move further in the implementation. But this programme is another example of policy wonks formulating massive, abstract packages to shove onto Southern countries shoulders - rather than being truly altruistic. Moreover, the leader of this programme is a genius but acts like a prankster child who needs an army of people to clean up after his ideas - who does not necessarily have the practical sense on how to manage or implement things.

Basically, the development world is screwed in this region if management continues to operate like headless chickens. Meanwhile, programme staff who are achieving a good number of things, in terms of linking civil society or networks of people living with HIV and AIDS, or ensure that policies are examined in a gender-sensitive manner, are stunted from moving their projects forward. There are added challenges of power relations (and personal politics) within this organisation, particularly those within South Asia. Too much talking from men, not enough doing, for instance. Or uber-aggressive women without much compassion for other team members.

I honestly do not know how much longer I can sit through these hierarchies and abuses of relative power. There are too many massive reprecussions for speaking out and there is no appropriate forum for expressing grievances.

Then again Im on a precarious contract anyway, so I could bloody well be sacked for any reason - so maybe they are more threatened by me, as I am part of the disgruntled masses who preach ethics, social justice and equality....Perhaps.

Rambutan, Durian, Zulfi, Flatmate

2006-09-09T17:50:00.000+05:30

Rambutan (red lychee) and Durian season are over. Durian is a strange fruit that smells atrocious - like sour garbage, and tastes like burnt soysauce with a texture of chicken or some kind of sinewy meat. You are not spossed to eat durian after drinking any alcohol, apparently the doshas - or energies - are both heated so the compounds can kill you. I will have to keep that in mind before boarding a 30-hour flight back to North America.

Also, a photo of my trusty three-wheeler, Zulfi. His son is Zafar (as tagged on the front of his three-wheeler), daughters are Zahara and Zara, and wife is Begem. Completely patient, loyal, my daily newsman, tourguide, translator, price negotiator at markets, mechanic, body guard, and chauffeur. At this point, I dont know what Id do without him! Even his wife cooks me rasam - a soup made of only spices - when I have fevers, and makes me polos - a very difficult curry made from a tuber that resembles jack fruit.

Finally, a photo of my flatmate, a British intellectual property lawyer, who has an active social life and queue of admirers. Now he is redeeming his soul by working on conflict and poverty issues with a local NGO. A bit flamboyant with obnoxious jetsetting friends, including two main squeezes - a Cockneyed-accented, coddled Sri Lankan girl and a French born-lisping metrosexual peace journalist of North African descent. Are they dating - no one really knows, but they are the drama queens in this rather posh flat.

Still, a good change from the chaos in Wella Watte.

Fighting monks

2006-08-18T11:27:00.000+05:30

To clarify, the school that was bombed by the Government of Sri Lanka in the north, was, in fact, a school for orphaned girls. GoSL had the coordinates, knew it was a regular school, committed the war atrocity anyway.

To add to the horror and sorrow, a beloved advocate for peace and research partner at Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA), Mr. Ketheesh Loganathan. He was gunned down at his home by anonymous assailants, government blaming LTTE, but government could be behind it or know more than is telling. Mr. Loganathan worked as Deputy Secretary General of the Peace Secretariat for the government of Sri Lanka, and headed the Poverty and Conflict Analysis unit at CPA until this past April. Definitely telling that academics, activists, scholars are targets and it is hard to find independent news source.

In a separate incident, right-wing Buddhist monks picked fights with anti-war protestors at one of the main parks in Colombo, yesterday evening. Swinging punches for peace? Chanting fascism intermingled with promises of intransient being?

An interesting site on all that is Sri Lankan: http://www.indi.ca/

more than 60 kids bombed, then more bombings in Colombo

2006-08-17T11:29:00.000+05:30

In addition, UNICEF helped to run this 'orphanage', possibly a school or programme for former child soldiers. Gov't of Sri Lanka claims the school was a training camps for child soldiers. In any case, more than 60 CHILDREN were massacred - I am utterly stunned. More than 800 civilians have died these past few months due to intensified fighting. International gaze averted to Middle East, all is lost:

COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers said a government bombing raid hit an orphanage in rebel territory in the island's north on Monday, killing 43 schoolgirls and wounding 60 as the worst fighting since a 2002 truce raged.

"The Sri Lankan air force bombed the premises of an orphanage where schoolgirls were studying first aid," Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) spokesman I. Ilanthirayan said. "Forty-three... students were killed and 60 wounded."

A military source said air raids had been launched on rebel territory on Monday but said they had no details of targets hit or casualties.

By Simon Gardner

COLOMBO (Reuters) - Seven people were killed and 17 others were injured on Monday, when a security forces convoy escorting a Pakistan embassy vehicle was hit by a Claymore fragmentation mine, officials and bomb squad officers said.

A driver from the convoy said the embassy vehicle was slightly damaged, but no one was hurt. He refused to identify any passengers in the vehicle. The Pakistani ambassador was uninjured, the bomb squad said.

"Seven people were dead on arrival. We have 17 other people who are injured and being treated now," Colombo National Hospital director Hector Weerasinghe.

The blast shook the windows of the Reuters office in the capital, and hit just hours after a suspected Tamil Tiger front threatened to attack civilians if the military continued attacks on Tamil Tiger rebel territory.

The rebels had earlier on Monday accused the government of bombing an orphanage in rebel territory and killing 43 schoolgirls.

A driver from the convoy which was escorting a Pakistan embassy vehicle said he believed the convoy had been hit by two Claymore fragmentation mines.

The embassy vehicle was slightly damaged, but nobody in it was injured.

The Pakistani Embassy was immediately available for comment.

A three wheeler taxi was on fire. The other vehicles in the convoy continued away from the site of the blast. Ambulances rushed to the scene.

The blast shook the windows of the Reuters office in the capital, and comes just hours after a suspected Tamil Tiger front threatened to attack civilians if the military continued attacks on Tamil Tiger rebel territory.

FIGHTING DISPLACES 100,000

The government accused the rebels of shelling civilian areas in the northern Jaffna peninsula, saying it feared fatalities as the worst fighting since a 2002 ceasefire raged on.

The military said it had launched air strikes on identified Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) targets such as camps in the northeast, but gave no further details.

With contact with the conflict-hit areas limited, the LTTE report on the bombing of the orphanage could not be immediately confirmed. Aid workers estimate around 100,000 people have been displaced during three weeks of fighting. Dozens are confirmed dead, and many fear the eventual death toll will be far higher.

"The Sri Lankan air force bombed the premises of an orphanage where schoolgirls were studying first aid," Tiger military spokesman Rasiah Ilanthiraiyan said. "Forty-three ... students were killed and 60 wounded."

He said the students were between 15 and 18 years old.

The government said civilian casualties were also likely around the Jaffna peninsula, where the LTTE over-ran government forward positions on Saturday, although the army says they had since been repulsed. The rebels, who ignored a government demand to surrender, are furious at President Mahinda Rajapakse's outright rejection of their demands for a separate ethnic homeland for Tamils in the island's north and east.

"They have mingled with civilians and are calling artillery fire onto the areas of the security forces," said Major Upali Rajapakse of the National Security Center. "It is falling in and around civilian areas. There has to be civilian dead."

He said the country's east was quiet but artillery rained down on Kayts island, just to the west of Jaffna town, and was being fired across a no-man's land that separates government from rebel territory around 20 miles to the east.

STOCKPILING FOOD

The pro-rebel Web site www.tamilnet.com said 15 civilians were killed when army rockets and shells hit a church, but there was no independent confirmation.

Jaffna residents flocked to shops to stockpile food after the army briefly lifted a curfew. With no prospect of fresh supplies from the country's south, prices of basic goods were soaring.

"We are used to being displaced, but this time it came about so suddenly we were ill-prepared," said 50-year-old fisherman Ledil Amaldas, who fled his coastal village and is staying with a relative in Jaffna.

"I have 5,000 rupees ($48) with me," he said, standing in a long queue to buy sugar and flour. "I hope we can manage for another 12-14 days. After that I don't know what will happen."

The High Security Zone Residents Liberation Force (HSZRLF), a presumed Tiger front group that says it wants the military out of civilian areas, said if the military targeted minority Tamils then bombs would explode in the majority Sinhalese south.

We regret to inform that the HSZRLF's Central Committee has given orders to all cadres stationed across the island to carry out attacks against civilian targets in southern Sri Lanka if Sri Lankan armed forces continue to massacre innocent unarmed civilians in the Northeast," it said in a faxed statement.

The HSZRLF claimed responsibility for previous attacks on troops in the north, and proclaimed a ceasefire in early 2006 when the Tigers went to peace talks before claiming more attacks in April. Analysts say it is clearly a Tiger front.

Many of Sri Lanka's most prominent Tamils come from Jaffna and analysts say the Tigers are bent on eventually capturing a town that they have controlled in previous phases of a war which has killed more than 65,000 people since 1983.

Anthropological Study of an American Pop Star in Dubai, While Bombs Drop Over Baghdad, Beirut, Muttur, Jaffna…

2006-08-04T09:43:00.000+05:30

Delayed in Dubai airport, while en route to Montreal to attend a friend’s wedding. Journey, as usual, is wrought with witnessing glaring vulgarities of enormous wealth. I am mesmerised by some familiar pop star reading Anthony Keidis’ autobiography, who is concentrating on the perfection of his hair, instead of waking up to the realities of Middle East brutality. I am using my return business class ticket for my flight, so it offers a glimpse into the vacuous noggins of the obscenely rich – ah, but perhaps I have already become one, at least as I am considered in Sri Lanka. But I cannot understand the rich and comfortable decision to sit back and watch atrocities unfold on telly, and not lambast their governments, international organisation, neighbours, their own consumption, for not doing a bloody thing!

What must pass through this bimbo pop star’s head (o, what is his name? Some-kind-of-singer) to ignore, not even blink, at the carnage unfolding on the bbc? Moreover, how have we gotten to the point where genocide, massive amounts of unfounded violence, is a pleasurable pastime, that can never really satiate our hollywoodised appetite for destruction?

Meanwhile, I am doubly disturbed about my companion passenger coming from Colombo. Apparently, this Indian fellow is in charge of marketing, developing, controlling, managing, cracking the slave whip, of Victoria’s Secret in Sri Lanka. His factories produce all the fabric used for Victoria’s Secret – serviced by sub-contracted Korean manufactories. This fabric supplies all the sub-contractors that produce lingerie, swim-wear, and all ready-made garments (ah, the latest season’s fashions) for Victoria’s Secret, as well as Next, Neiman Marcus, Marks& Spencer’s, Gap. I noted to him that it is interesting that none of these garments are available domestically in Sri Lanka – everything is produced and exported from the Export Processing Zones, surrounding the airport. This nameless Indian guy finished off the summer’s end blitz of preparing to meet Back-to School clothing demands, and now is off to join his Zambian wife (daughter of a Prime Minister) and 3 children on a trip to Egypt, snowing South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Oh, you should have heard the way he romanticised Africa – all deserted, with lovely noble savages – Maasai. It is perplexing to observe class stratification within a formerly colonised society (albeit, India or Zambia or Sri Lanka).

I tried to bring up that I visited a garment workers’ home, 9 crammed into a 8 sq. ft slum dwelling, and that they had no idea what clothing lines they supplied. They had no idea about fair wages or that they are entitled to good working conditions, as Sri Lanka is bound to ILO codes. It means little that these garment workers often turn to seeking other forms of employment to supplement their monthly pittances. In addition to slave labour, in order to clothe the emperors of this neo-liberal paradigm, many of these young women become sex workers or members of terrorist circles. In the case of Nason, he harboured impoverished LTTE cadres in the home he also let out to garment workers; are the lines blurred here?

So however much I chat with this moghul about workers’ conditions coming before profit, he argues that the workers for V.S. are taken care of, that bad incidences of factories are only anecdotal not indicative of the whole industry, and that he is offering them employment. It is often true that many women living in poverty prefer a job in a sweatshop, rather than revert to begging or sex work, but it cannot be the main excuse to continue to let labour conditions deteriorate. No matter how much you harp on, try to explain things from an economic perspective (many studies show that good wage and working conditions improve productivity, stability in employment, commitment to MNCs, etc), the rich and powerful do not listen, as they want to hang on to their small bit of wealth and power.

In other news, there are 22,000 recently displaced Sri Lankans, due to escalating violence in North and East. Tigers have bombed Muttur – a predominantly Muslim town near Jaffna. Unfounded and unforgiveable. So this brief journey, as I continue to wait in Dubai, has shown more interconnections of violence, only there are significant differences in terms of which ones corporate media decides to highlight.

P.S. Words of Caution: Don't Eat Dorian Fruit If Drinking Alcohol - some say it can cause death?!

sunday morning

2006-07-23T13:46:00.000+05:30

thom yorke has new album, indepedent but intrinsically influenced by radiohead, which is alarmingly good and full of good samples.

and about the continuation of the conflict in mid-east. it's just exacerbated by us/uk involvement. im so sick of it, but i cant imagine how the people living there feel about it. it makes absolutely no sense that israel invades lebanon! it really is all starting to collapse and a matter of time before it spreads to most inhabited places, i.e. pakistan-india, amerikkka, etc. we all know that it was from the decree of us/uk, that it is a way to sink their teeth in the region. and we've royally skrewd it up for the next couple centuries. who's keen idea was it put a jewish 'homeland' by bulldozing present day inhabitants, at the expense of another minority? and i;ve already had my fill of listening to bizarre anti-semitic conversations for the week. i tend to take the zero-tolerance view on hierarchies of power and perpetuating inequalities that only serve to spawn and rebirth global capitalism and to squeeze the last drop of black gold. it is truly gruesome and unforgivable. so basically, coming from the latest chummy talk between bush and blair at G8, us outsourced 'reconstruction' of afghanistan to canada and its trans-national corporations, and iraq to uk TNCs, so that it could be more focused at the wheel of tarnation in israel-lebanon-syria. ah, but at least now we can say the un will be on board, gagged and bound!

it is all reminiscent of the situation in sri lanka - conflict with no end in sight. the more i learn about it the more complex it is. it is not clear-cut in terms of buddhists v. tamil hindus v. tamil muslims/et al. nor about 2 sides fighting each other for a scrap of (the best) land in north and east. there are viable ways to end the conflict if each side is willing to go through processes of demilitarisation, but there is no commitment on either side and there is too much money/power at stake. (you think western patriarchy is bad - take a glimpse at south asian schoolboy patriarchical mentality). and just last week, we saw a major general of ltte admitted to a prominent hospital in colombo (where there is a ban on admitting ltte members into south). meanwhile, the former bitch president, chandrika, helped get the main ltte fellow's daughter a visa in order for her to study in uk. what kind of reasoning is that??? so the government is working hand in hand with ltte, at the expense of poor civilians caught in cross-fire. absolutely mad! neither gov't or ltte is serious about peace talks, ceasefire etc - they are the face of the same side of the coin.

life otherwise on this island paradise is fairly tame - truly tropical and lovely, but sweltering! such friendly, smiling people. the best food in the world, and such different landscapes. i recently shifted to subletting a room in a posh apartment with a semi-gay/metrosexual intellectual property lawyer, who currently works on building up conflict-areas' livelihoods. nice fellow, a bit erratic, very sociable and a parade of men, women and beasts coming through each evening to fawn over him. a bit surreal change from the other residence, which served to prop up the ltte. i've been learning to cook sri lankan and to speak tamil....

WTF with the Zionist invasion of Lebanon?!

2006-07-16T12:33:00.000+05:30

And they're bloody well sending Condaleeza Rice in to negotiate Cease Fire Agreement? Who will offer the highest bid for the reconstruction contracts? With the nation-state eroding how can we still justify utterly brutal, genocidal wars in the name of one's 'sovereign' capability to do so: 'cos we feel like it'? Are we using the facade of territoriality (mine vs. yours vs. ours) to further the corporate-led military project? Hot damn: this is what 'progress' looks like!

so people in the Gulf should drive less, consume less?

2006-07-13T09:03:00.000+05:30

Development: Crowded planet feels the heat

New York, 11 Jul (IPS/Fritzroy A. Sterling) -- Consider the following statistics: at
the beginning of the 20th century, the world population was less than two billion,
but at the dawn of the 21st century, there were more than six billion people on
earth.

According to the US Census Bureau's population clock, the world's population is
now 6,527,525,419. Every 14 years, one billion people are added to the planet. At
this rate, the total number of people in the world will be a little more than 9.1
billion in 50 years.

Although the population growth rate has slowed, the world's population is still
growing. The US population is projected to reach 300 million by October.

According to a report by the Washington-based group Population Connection,
more than half of the world's population will live in cities by 2007, "Making us,
for the first time, an urban species."

Emissions of greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming have also
increased significantly since the 20th century. There are greater concentrations of
carbon dioxide (CO2), one of the chief contributors to global warming, in the
atmosphere as a result of continued burning of fossil fuels.

"We have to look at the overall contribution of human activities as it relates to
increased CO2 emissions since industrialisation," said Jay Gulledge, senior
research fellow for Science and Impacts at the Pew Centre on Global Climate
Change.

"There has been a 35% increase in the concentration of atmospheric CO2, up from
280 ppm (parts per million) pre-industrial times to a current 380 ppm."

As the population increases, particularly in urban areas, the demand for more
energy requires power plants that already emit huge volumes of greenhouse gases
to produce even more. And as people in lesser developed countries gain access to
electricity, more power plants that emit greenhouse gases are built.

Population growth also goes hand-in-hand with deforestation and clearing of land
to make way for urban sprawl. While living forests act as "carbon sinks",
absorbing greenhouse gases, dead and decaying trees emit carbon into the
atmosphere.

"A third of all current CO2 emissions come from automobiles," Gulledge added.
"Coal-fired power plants and heavy industry also accounts for much of the
greenhouse gas emissions."

"Population growth and global warming are definitely intertwined," Janet Larsen,
director of research at the Earth Policy Institute, told IPS. "A growing population
means a growing use of energy."

The US currently has five percent of the world's population, but produces 25% of
the world's global warming pollution, according to a report by the US-based
environmental group Sierra Club. Together, the most industrialised nations
consume 60% of the world's fossil fuels.

The George W. Bush administration has not offered any indication that it will
accept the terms of the Kyoto Protocol, which has been ratified by 163 nations,
because it believes that the treaty to reduce CO2 emissions would put a strain on
the economy, resulting in a decline in GDP.

US officials have also complained that India and China, two of the biggest emitters
of greenhouse gases, are exempt from the requirements of the Kyoto Protocol.

"The Kyoto Protocol was designed to be a first step in what is to become a more
progressive effort," said Tim Herzog, a research associate at the World Resources
Institute. "China and India will have to be addressed in a significant way in
subsequent meetings."

Still, many critics argue that since the nation that emits more than any other, the
US must take a more proactive approach to setting an international standard for the
reduction of greenhouse gases.

"The US consumes more energy and emits more greenhouse gases than any other
nation on earth," Janet Sawin, senior researcher and director of the Energy and
Climate Change Programme at the Worldwatch Institute, told IPS.

"If you add 100,000 more people to the population here, and 100,000 people to a
country in sub-Saharan Africa, the effect of greenhouse gas emissions here would
be far greater because we use more energy per capita here than someone in
sub-Saharan Africa does."

The combined effects of global warming and population growth are palpable,
despite efforts by groups such as the National Centre for Policy Analysis (NCPA)
to cast doubt on the science behind global warming.

According to an October 2005 report from NCPA, "Historical data and ongoing
hurricane research reveal scant evidence linking human-caused warming to more
frequent or powerful hurricanes."

Gulledge dismissed those claims. "I don't speak in absolute terms because science
is not absolute," he said.

"But there is hard scientific evidence that global warming affects hurricanes,
making them more intense in general and more frequent in the Northern Atlantic.
Global warming is causing the loss of mountain glaciers, and some two billion
people rely on glaciers for water supply."

John Seager, the president of Population Connection, said that too often, the
debate about population growth and global warming ignores the fundamental
question of population control.

"There is a deafening silence when it comes to the question of population growth,"
he said. "Most of the discussions about how to handle population growth are
dominated by technological discussions versus basic family planning."

According to Seager, people everywhere should control basic decision-making
about when and whether to have children. This, he said, would in the long run curb
population growth and, eventually, the effects of unchecked population growth on
global warming.

Others argue that undertaking adaptive and preventive policies simultaneously will
best alleviate the effects of global warming.

"We need to act now to do what we can to slow down the rate of global warming,"
said Larsen.

"Most of the world's population growth will occur in underdeveloped countries
where people are most vulnerable to severe climate changes. Therefore,
underdeveloped countries have to develop in a manner that is sustainable."

The transition to cleaner fuels must be swift and widespread, according to Herzog.
He said that people everywhere should become less reliant on coal and petroleum.
"Because growth results in increased GDP, governments should explore
hydropower and wind energy," Herzog said.

Protecting Americans through Torture, Eavesdropping, Dictatorial Decrees

2006-07-06T14:53:00.000+05:30

United States: Signing away the Constitution?

New York, 1 Jul (IPS/William Fisher) -- Last March, the US Congress passed
legislation requiring Justice Department officials to give them reports by certain
dates on how the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is using the USA Patriot
Act to search homes and secretly seize papers.

But when President George W. Bush signed the measure into law, he added a
"signing statement". The statement said the president can order Justice Department
officials to withhold any information from Congress if he decides that it could
impair national security or executive branch operations.

Late last year, Congress approved legislation declaring that US interrogators
cannot torture prisoners or otherwise subject them to cruel, inhuman, and
degrading treatment.

But President Bush's signing statement said the president, as commander in chief,
can waive the torture ban if he decides that harsh interrogation techniques will
assist in preventing terrorist attacks.

These are but two examples of more than 100 signing statements containing over
500 constitutional challenges that President Bush has added to new laws passed by
the Congress - many times more than any of his predecessors.

While he has never vetoed a law, many constitutional scholars say the president is,
in effect, exercising a "line item veto" by giving himself authority to waive parts of
laws he doesn't like.

The practice has infuriated members of Congress in both parties because it
threatens to diminish their power. They consider it an assault on the notion that the
constitution establishes the United States' three branches of government -
legislative, judicial, and executive - as co-equal.

Further fuelling Congressional anger is Bush's defence of his National Security
Agency (NSA) "domestic eavesdropping" programme, in which the president
claimed that he could ignore a 1978 law prohibiting wiretaps of US citizens
without "probable cause" and a warrant issued by a court.

The NSA programme was revealed by the New York Times last December. Since
then, newspapers have disclosed other secret programmes, including amassing
millions of domestic phone call records and examining perhaps thousands of
financial transactions in an effort to track and interrupt possible terrorist activity.

A member of Bush's own party, Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, chairman
of the Senate Judiciary Committee, opened hearings on the subject this week. He
said, "The real issue here is whether the president can cherry-pick what he likes."

And the senior Democrat on the committee, Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont,
said, "The president hasn't vetoed any bills, but basically he has done a personal
veto. He has said which laws he will not follow and... put himself above the law,
even the same law he has signed."

The hearing is part of a continuing effort by many in Congress to reclaim authority
that they say the president has usurped as he has expanded the power of the
executive branch.

Bush claims that the constitution gives the executive branch of government
"inherent power" to do "whatever it takes" to protect the people of the United
States.

Testifying at the Judiciary Committee hearing on behalf of the Bush
administration, Michelle Boardman, deputy assistant attorney general in the Office
of Legal Counsel at the US Department of Justice, said that signing statements
serve a "legitimate and important function" and are not an abuse of power.

"Congress should not fear signing statements, but welcome the openness they
provide," she said. "The president must execute the law faithfully, but the
constitution is the highest law of the land. If the constitution and the law conflict,
the president must choose," she said.

But many constitutional scholars disagree.

Among them is Barbara Olshansky, director of the Global Justice Initiative at the
Centre for Constitutional Rights, a prominent advocacy group. She told IPS, "I
think it is hard evidence of (Bush's) continued aggressive arrogation of power. It is
a blatant attempt to expand power by pulling the rug out from under Congress each
time it passes a bill that he dislikes."

She added, "Many of the laws that Bush has decided to bypass or overwrite by this
method involve the military, where he once again invokes the idea that as
commander-in-chief he can ignore any law that seeks to regulate the military."

Another opposition view came from Prof. Edward Herman of the University of
Pennsylvania, who told IPS, "The brazenness of Bush's use of this practice is
remarkable. But even more remarkable is the fact that this de facto further
nullification of congressional authority fails to elicit sustained criticism and
outrage. It is part of a step-by-step abrogation of constitutional government, and it
is swallowed by the flag-wavers and normalised."

"We are in deep trouble," he added.

Signing statements are not new - their use started with the fifth US President,
James Monroe (1817-1825), and from that time they were used sparingly and
mostly for rhetorical purposes. Until Ronald Reagan became President in 1980,
only 75 statements had been issued. Reagan and his successors, George H. W.
Bush and Bill Clinton, made 247 signing statements between them.

But President Bush has taken the practice to a new level, attracting criticism both
for the number of statements he has issued as well as for his apparent attempts to
nullify any legal restrictions on his actions.

Democratic members of both the House of Representatives and the Senate are
viewing President Bush's signing statements as a dangerous over-reach of
presidential power - and a campaign issue for the congressional elections in
November.

Last week, House Democrats introduced a resolution requiring the president to
notify Congress if the president "makes a determination to ignore a duly enacted
provision of law".

And Senator Edward M. Kennedy, known as the "lion" of the Senate, declared this
week, "For far too long, Congress has stood by and watched while President Bush
has slowly expanded the unilateral powers of the presidency at the expense of the
rest of the government and the people."

The US legal community is also concerned. Earlier this month, the American Bar
Association's board of directors formed a Task Force on Presidential Signing
Statements and the Separation of Powers Doctrine to review the use of signing
statements and whether or not this use is consistent with the US Constitution.

Bush's signing statements have covered a wide variety of subjects, ranging from
the ability of military lawyers to give independent legal advice to their
commanders to timely transmission of government-funded scientific information
to Congress to rules for firing a government employee whistle-blower who tells
Congress about possible wrongdoing.

But until President Bush's signing statement on the anti-torture legislation, the
subject went virtually unreported by the US press.

According to Phillip Cooper, a Portland State University public administration
professor who is an authority on signing statements, "I think one of the important
things here is for reporters to apply their journalistic instincts to this story."

Cooper concludes that the Bush White House "has very effectively expanded the
scope and character of the signing statement not only to address specific
provisions of legislation that the White House wishes to nullify, but also in an
effort to significantly re-position and strengthen the powers of the presidency
relative to the Congress."

Am. Soldiers charged with Murder in Iraq

2006-06-20T15:12:00.000+05:30

But how do you bring charges against a whole country, whether it's murder directly, implicitly, structurally, through history, bigotry, capitalism, religion?, man - hooo-eeeee!

By Will Dunham (Reuters)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Three American soldiers were charged with premeditated murder after being accused of shooting three detainees north of Baghdad on May 9 and then threatening to kill a fellow soldier if he told the truth about the incident, the U.S. military said on Monday.

The charges were brought against Army Staff Sgt. Raymond Girouard, Spc. William Hunsaker and Pfc. Corey Clagett, according to charge sheets provided by Army officials at the Pentagon. Premeditated murder charges can bring the death penalty under U.S. military law.

The three soldiers are accused of deliberately allowing three men detained during a raid on a former chemical factory to flee so they would have an excuse to shoot them, said a defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The charges were brought as the U.S. military continues to investigate other cases of alleged abuses by American troops, including the killings of 24 unarmed civilians in the town of Haditha last November.

Girouard, a noncommissioned officer, was charged with 11 counts stemming from four charges: premeditated murder, attempted murder, conspiracy and wrongfully communicating a threat. Clagett was charged with six counts and Hunsaker was charged with eight counts of the same charges.

India's eunuchs

2006-06-06T18:26:00.000+05:30

India's eunuchs seek new way

By Sanghamitra Chakraborty in Tamil Nadu

Eunuchs have been ostracised for years.

Sudha is dusky and wears a salwar kameez, a traditional dress for women in India, but no make-up. She is a eunuch (or "aruvani" as they now prefer to be called) and represents a group of transsexuals seeking respect for their identity and greater acceptance in society.

"While transgender people must protect their identity, we are willing to do our bit to gain acceptance," says Sudha on the sidelines of a community festival in southern Tamil Nadu state.

"If necessary we will dress down, tone down our speech, even desist from the commonly misunderstood practice of 'clapping' and negotiate with people in work and social settings." Since most hijras end up being stereotyped as cross-dressing men, feared for their lewdness and aggression, the aruvanis face many day-to-day challenges, linked with their identity.

New tactics
For most hijras, as Indian transsexuals are called, their physical appearance is an extension of their transgender identity. Lavish doses of make-up, flowing wigs, harsh, staccato clapping and aggressively sexual speech and body language are tokens of belonging, entrenched at an early age by community leaders.

Aruna and her friends want eunuchs to tone down their behaviour. Sudha and her friends want hijras to change tactics to win acceptance. Eunuch groups now participate in community-led inter-personal communication sessions regularly in what they see as a pragmatic way to learn how to negotiate with the mainstream.

"We are focusing on the aruvani being a woman in day-to-day life, not just in front of the mirror at home," says Sudha.
Bharathi Kannamma, an eunuch who edits a community journal, says the communication sessions seem to be addressing the problem.

"Earlier, when aruvanis were teased or harassed, they fought back often by shouting and using foul abuse. This created a bad impression in the minds of the general community," she says.

Spreading awareness
A trainer, Rajakumari, says eunuchs are much more in control of their lives after attending the sessions. "We aruvanis have achieved in the past two years what was left undone in the past 20 years. Wait and see what young aruvanis can do."

Aruna, transsexual
"When people mock or tease them, they don't take off in a rage as they understand that the public can be ignorant or insensitive," she says.

There is more on the minds of the aruvanis than celebrating their yearly festival in the village of Koovagam in Tamil Nadu.
"We're fighting for our right to live and work with dignity as other women do. The violence against transgender people must stop," says Sudha's friend Aruna, who marched along with 500 other transgender protesters.

"They lead many self-help groups working in Tamil Nadu, spreading awareness about safe sex and HIV to hundreds of transsexuals, many of whom are sex workers or beggars." Delhi-based historian activist Mario D' Penha says there is a "huge debate" raging in the eunuch community "about the right path to integration and whether they should be seen as eunuchs or women".

Not recognised as females by law, these castrated males face a very real identity crisis. Once their surgery has taken place they are no longer considered male and there is no legal framework in place to deal with them.

Eunuchs in India face an identity crisis

One of the most important aspects of the training is to impress upon the community the need for safe sex. Since many of them are extremely vulnerable to HIV, given their social isolation and low literacy levels, short films, documentaries and modern parables are used to improve social skills and to highlight health issues, such as the need to use condoms.

"From living on the fringes of society, they are not only working towards 'mainstreaming' themselves, but are now focusing on expression of their hidden talents that can contribute to them being accepted as citizens in their own rights," says Dr R Lakshmi Bai, chief of a local HIV prevention project.

Aruna is hopeful about the future. "This is the way to go. We aruvanis have achieved in the past two years what was left undone in the past 20 years. Wait and see what young aruvanis can do."

Talk about human interconnectedness!

2006-06-04T13:35:00.000+05:30

Apparently, Nason, the cook who worked for my landlady and ran away around the time of Hindu New Year, was involved in the Colombo suicide attack. While we idly chatted about Sri Lankan cuisine, whether you add turmeric or ground ‘katagum’ to lady finger curry, three or four women took up residence in Nason’s apartment in Pettah district, Colombo 01. While Nason claims he is from Kandy – near Hunas Falls – he has an Indian Tamil accent, according to the landlady.

The LTTE is well equipped, with imported, contraband weapons and military-related technologies. Skilled technicians can operate satellite-controlled weapons; they have warplanes and ships. They have the military might, jaded youth to comprise their army, funds extorted from the global Tamil diaspora, the immense corruption within Sri Lankan government to work to their advantage, and a thirst for bloodshed, but no state. Meanwhile the flaccid, malevolent, racist government that is recognised and supported by the international community, is losing ground in terms of its military capacity and definitions for a peaceful future. So the back alleyways and shady wheeling and dealings rule this country; be prepared to bribe your way through it. With economic development and job growth only concentrated in Colombo, disenfranchisement, abject poverty, hopelessness looms in the rest of the country. It’s an easy entry point for the LTTE to ‘swoop in’ to offer jobs, cold hard cash, and a glimpse of infamy to many people living in poverty, primarily to Tamils like Nason.

I do not know the whole story of Nason’s involvement, only that the military police frequently stop by the residence to question my landlady, as his former employer. It is believed that he harboured in his apartment three or four women, possibly former garment workers, who knew the pregnant suicide bomber. It is possible that these women helped to get her fake identity cards, or they could have monitored the Army Headquarters and Hospital to check when the head of the Army arrived to the compound after lunch. Nason evidently knew everything about attack, and has since vanished, along with the three or four women accomplices. His daughter, Wani, who I met on her birthday, still calls the landlady to find out where he is. If he is discovered in Sri Lanka he will likely be detained, questioned with torture, imprisoned and executed in the most inhumane, incomprehensible way – many of the ‘disappeared’ Tamils who ended up in government hands during the last 20 years were cut into pieces and their mark on history was erased from within their unmarked, mass graves.

The blast that occurred on 27 April, injured an high-ranking army general, and killed several people including his driver and bodyguard. A young woman, plotted with the LTTE to become pregnant in order to qualify for maternity services at the Army hospital. Her fake papers stated that her husband was a Singhalese officer. This meticulous plan was carried out over six or seven months, all throughout the peace talks, lowlighting that the LTTE was never really serious about securing, long-term, sustainable peace. And I’m just in awe to know what went through this young woman’s head, how was she convinced to become a part of this scheme? Am I too bold to believe that this is a blatant attempt by masculinised military institutions to play on women’s perceived roles as mother/nurturer/docile/obedient/subordinate in order to achieve archaic, dehumanizing, violent ends? These perceived gender roles are more pronounced here, so it is not surprising that this pregnant LTTE cadre was never searched or questioned when she entered the compound. Or is it a way for the LTTE to show that it is willing to sacrifice its people (and instead offer a childless future) until it gets what it wants – in a rather disgusting tantrum?

The folks in Colombo – particularly the foreigners - are still shaken by the immense violence that shrouds this talented, beautiful, glorious ‘pearl of the Indian Ocean’. And most people I talk to cannot wrap their heads around these events. But I wonder if by the LTTE using a young woman and unborn child to scaremonger the comparably rich denizens of Colombo into reacting, into giving land rights, recognition of state, sovereignty…if they do not just undermine their cause? If they do not just fit more easily into the rest of the world’s misguided, simplistic, dichotomous conceptions about terrorism, i.e. Hollywood ‘good’ vs. ‘evil.’ With no value for human life, how can this circle of so-called leftist intellectuals and foreign-educated elites pretend that they are fighting for the ‘dignity’ of Tamils in Sri Lanka? What about the Tamil tea pickers, completely fucked over by North and East Tamil communities, by Singhalese compatriots, and by foreign plantation owners, investors and probably the slough of foreign development workers? What about the Veddah indigenous peoples also absent in the discussions on how the former colony of Ceylon should operate, implement human rights, and grant access to basic services and profound freedoms? Hence the pernicious fight between zealous Buddhist nationalists and a corrupt circle of criminals claiming to represent the views of the marginalised Tamil communities, sees no end. One colleague described this war in everything but name, as the only way for the LTTE to assert its existence, because it could not face the arduous task of forming a separate state and all that entails.

We are all complicit in this Sri Lankan ‘uncivil’ war, (in all wars against humanity) moreso when we do nothing to speak out for peace, worldwide and at home. I am inconsolable about my complicity knowing that my connection to all of it is right under my nose and I can do little to prevent it from happening. Moreover, you really cannot trust anyone.

Warning: Gruesome!

2006-05-19T09:45:00.000+05:30

To let us remember those massacred, whose identity the government-backed media tries to conceal

Let us remember that war is not a numbers game, or a way to promote one's power or might, but that primarily it is a loss of life, individuality, sweetness of human character, and extinguishes the potential for future generations to correct past brutal, warmongering mistakes. The conflict in Sri Lanka is going in circles, many of the recent attacks replicate those from the last 20 years.

A story written by friend of my Sri Lankan colleague, to shed light on this massacre in November 1995.

Night was falling. My Kiri Amma (grand mother) retuned through paddy field directing a herd of cattle back home. She had vaguely seen some strange boys in dark suits sitting by the pathway, in unusual places. She was old, eyesight was poor. If not, that wouldn't have been the last time she returned home. There were 13 homes in our village. Many were poor farmers. There was one home with a TV. As it was Sunday, we all gathered there to watch the tele drama. Seneviratne mama was cleaver; he said "we all should not stay here for long". He came to the road & found some strangers positioning around the place we gathered. Having nothing for his defense, he shouted. That was a call for others to flee. We heard gun fire, it was for Senevi mama. He laid down his life and saved some lives, because tigers had to start shooing before they circled the village completely.

Though we tried to run away, tigers were around us. My chuti nangi (little sister) was 4 yrs then, she did not eat without listening to a story. My brother was writing something in his school book. Suddenly

Tigers hit the front door. It was not made up of strong wood, so my father kept pushing from inside preventing force opening. When that failed, tigers fired several shots at my father thru the door, he fell still trying to keep it closed. They dashed inside, kicked my father's body away and chopped the head away. My mother held 3 of us firmly, trying in vain to cover us with her hands. When a tiger aimed his gun at us, she pleaded to leave the children. He went back

And came with another lady tiger. She had a sword. She grabbed my chuti nangi away from my mother's lap and cut her neck off. Then my brother because he tried to say something. Then my mother. When tiger girl hit my mother's neck with the sword, I fainted. Whole night long, I cried trying to wake up my mother. She jerked few times, and became silent. Her blood was warm, same warmth 3 children cherished until this day.

Whole night, I heard gun fires and my relatives crying. With each gun shot, their voices dwindled. I heard Renuka nenda crying next door, pleading them to kill her. Later I learnt why she pleased that way. A tiger man beheaded her mother, father, 3 brothers and only sister and

Brought all 6 heads to the road. They shot at the house opposite mine, then dashed in. There they killed Nawaratne mama's mother (my kiri amma), his elder bother, nanda and two daughters.

Following morning, many people came to see this wonder, one big person (a politician) even came in a helicopter. Bodies were collected by Army men and prepared for last rights but they could not reach the village cemetery because, tiger men were still waiting in ambush. There was another fire fight too. Then a bulldozer came and cut a mass grave and all bodies were laid in it and closed. Those killed on this day were,

1. K.R Amarasinghe Karunaratne

2. Punchiralage Somawathi

3. Saman Ravidralal Amarasinghe

4. Kumudu Nalanee Amarasinghe

5. A.Hethuhami

6. Nimal Karunartne

7. Mallika Damaynthi Karunaratne

8. Nadeeka Sandamalee Munasinghe

9. Pradeepa Sandamalee Munasinghe

10. Pulinguralage Chandradasa

11. Kapuruhamige Dhanapala

12. Sumudu Seneviratne

13. Murugathage Tikiribada

14. Jayantha Jayasiri Ranasinghe

15. Tikiri Bandage Siriyalatha

16. Piyadasage Nandaseeli

17. Gunasekarae Nimalwanshe

18. Piyasenage Wijesena

19. Nimal Wanshage Sriyani Surangika Nomalwanshe

20. Nimal Wanshage Priyanthe Nimalwanshe

21. R.D.A.Chadradasa

22. Malhami Punchibandage Kumarashinghe

23. Podi Appuhamige Seethawathi

24. Kumarasinghage Sisira Kumarasinghe

25. Kumarasinghage Samantha Kumarasinghe

26. Kumarasinghage Malkanthi Kumarasinghe

27. Mudalihamige Piyasena

28. Herathamige Tikirihami

29. Piyasenage Piyanka

30. Piyasenage Sunethra Nandani

31. Piyasenage Milinawathi

32. Piyasenage Nuwan Kumara

33. Piyasenage Rohana Sisira Kumara

34. Niluka Thilakasiri

35. Kumarasinghage Gamini Upathissa Kumarasinghe

36. Manthihamige Piyasena

37. Mudalihamige kalyanawathi

38. P.Sriyani Kusumalatha

39. P.Ramani Niranjala

40. P.Manori Priyanga

41. Mudalihamige Rangiethana

42. Wickramadasage Ranjana Jayakodi

43. Kandappurale Bedderalage Malhami

44. Siral Mohottalage Bebi Ethani.

Update:a note on Vesak

2006-05-16T09:33:00.000+05:30

I will continue to work in Sri Lanka even if the whole place goes up in flames. They have invested too much into this place (just had the inauguration) that they won't move. LTTE would be lunatic to attack an international place; they mainly target nationals, civilian places of interest, and try to impact the government's sources of revenue, i.e. WTC, financial sector. And since only poor civilians are mass murdered, the rich politicians in power do not get affected or make moves to remedy their own genocidal militarisitic tendencies.

There have not been any other attacks in Colombo since the last pregnant woman guerilla. But now the LTTE has taken to the seas and has kidnapped a gov't naval ship in which several Norwegian peace monitors were on board. It is strange since I had just gone to a SLMM (Peace monitors) party the weekend before and met several of the peace keepers. Lovely, lively, funny and stressed out folks. For now, life remains unusual, surreal and a bit disconnected from reality.

This past weekend was Vesak (Buddha's birthday, enlightenment and death day) so the whole country was lit up with lovely paper lanterns and gaudy Xmas lights. Some communities shelled out 30,000 USD to purchase these monstrous large, plastic, flashing light, carnival-looking structures that depict a story from Buddha's life. People hand out free food, ice cream and soda and there are lantern competitions. So for nearly 2 weeks there are lots of people, very pleasant, cheerful; a complete change from the horrors you see on tv. I also managed to get out of Colombo for the weekend to visit a beach 1 hr north. Expansive, clean beach, with billowing sails on fishing boats, and I was refreshed from the unpolluted air. So there is a huge disparity in how I celebrate life and witness all the bright, cheerfulness of my days around Colombo, and the grim news that I read or hear about. So indeed there is escalating violence, with no end in sight, and no seriousness going on in the peace talks, but there is also the mundane normalcy (however normal you can make of living in South Asia!).

Market in Fort Cochin

2006-04-30T13:52:00.000+05:30

The market and beach at Fort Cochin has everything and is extremely lively. Fishermen sell their day's catch and kiosk restaurants offer to cook and serve the catch to tourists. Local artists sell their etchings and handicrafts; Kerala has put alot of funds and efforts into promoting its local artists and performers. People even sell the latest in camera and portable music technology right there on the beach. At sunset half the city pours onto the beach to dip their feet in the waves and watch fishermen unload their Chinese fishing nets.

Kerala Backwaters

2006-04-30T13:18:00.000+05:30

One of the most memorable things about Kerala is its waterways, with small villages dotting the coastlines. The Vishnu festival and Good Friday abbreviated our trek further south, so we hovered around Cochi instead of taking a longer trip to the wildlife sancturaries and beaches. There is just too much to do in this relatively developed Communist, and largely Catholic state! Many of the villlages along the canals earn their income by distilling toddy (illegal moonshine from coconut milk) or processing coir (rope from coconut husks). In addition, there are small factories that process tiny mussles, that are made into calcium fertilisers and concrete supplements. Because it was Vishnu festival many of the villagers had their best clothing on; they had just returned from temple. Quite peaceful and sweltering!

Kerala, southern India

2006-04-30T13:10:00.000+05:30

A friend and I took a quick trip to Kerala for the April Hindu New Year. It turned into a ginormous shopping trip, loading up on saris, shalwars, spices, incense, weavings, artwork, nuts and delicacies, ayurvedic products and mahindi henna.

Siem Riep Market

2006-04-29T18:10:00.000+05:30

Sandstone and Bosstone Carvings at Terrace of the Leper King

2006-04-29T17:57:00.000+05:30

Ta Prohm

2006-04-29T17:19:00.000+05:30

Incredible and Indescribable!

And this is my tiny Sri Lankan friend from office.

Angkor Wat II

2006-04-29T14:47:00.000+05:30

Angkor Wat Palatial Complex I

2006-04-29T14:32:00.000+05:30

Temple Bayon II

2006-04-29T13:40:00.000+05:30

At Bayon's entrance religious women monks greet you/peddle you for money and to make an offering to Buddha. From my understanding the religion in Cambodia is a fusion of Hinduism and Buddhism, justufying Buddha's existence by claiming he is a reincarnation of Vishnu. In all the temples and in Angkor Wat palatial complex, there are incredibly complicated etched epics along all the walls. Emerging from the temple sites, there are usually market stalls with vendors selling every imaginable souvenir. The most beautiful silk scarves and silk handbags truly mark Cambodia;s survival in the textile industry, after the phase-out of quota system. From the International Labour Organisation, Cambodia is seen to have secured their markets in EU by promoting its high labor standards within its textile sector; but I'm always skeptical at this claim. And I defnly wish I had time to visit a silk farm and seen the extraction of silk from worms.

One of the most awestriking aspects about Cambodia is that about 70-80% of the country is under 21 years old, and only 20% of young girls finish primary school education. So when you see people over 40 you really notice. Does this mean that the textile industry is run by teenagers? How does that fit into ILO labor standards? There are many young marriages, with teenagers caring for their young children. It is really an interesting story in development that this country is built by such young people, all on motorbikes! Most young people speak English/French as well as Khmer. So I heard several stories from teenage shopkeepers that their parents were killed under the Khmer Rouge, and that they are bringing up their siblings. During the early morning when walking around some of the temples, young children beg tourists for US dollars while their older siblings run the market stalls and roadside cafes. In the late afternoon, children home from school spend their playtime selling trinkets to foreigners, (practicing their economics, geography and multiple languages). I;m not sure what to make of it all, given that I was there for such a short time, but the young people seem so resilient, charasmatic, charming, persistent, and the best salespeople I;ve ever seen in action!

Temple Bayon in Siem Riep

2006-04-29T13:11:00.000+05:30

Last month we held a regional orientation on trade-related issues and porjections of the Doha Development Round on meeting human development goals. Participants from all over Asia and Pacific region gathered in Siem Riep, and in the early mornings before the programme started I was able to visit some of the surrounding temples, including Bayon. Angkor Wat, the ancient Siamese capital had been abandoned when Thailand invaded it around 12th century. Malaria outbreaks and the high cost of running the massive city contributed to rulers' languid approach when invaders took over. For several centuries the city was left in ruins, for the rainforest to devour it. In 1920s a French traveller came across the intricately carved faces of Bayon, peering out eerily behind the jungle's curtains.

Only the tiles of the floors were left

2006-04-23T14:32:00.000+05:30

A brief trip south to Galle revealed on a very vivid, horrifying scale the impact of the tsunami on people living in the south and east of Sri Lanka. Colombo had relatively little damage and human loss, only there is a surge of displaced people and migrants who continually come to the large city in search of employment and their familial ties. But the trail of devastation accompanies your journey down to the southernmost tip of the country. Entire houses, shops, lives and livelihoods were swept away, with the shocking remnants of their concrete slab kitchen sinks and tiled floors still jutting out. Those people killed are generally buried in mass graves along the sea-facing road. Many of the former inhabitants moved in with their families, and despite official reports that most survivors are taken care of, people still live in donated tents, forage for food and stable income, and wait on their daily relief. Ironically, you see that many people used UNHCR tents to tarp over the damage in their homes.

It was difficult to walk around the tent cities, or to gawk at the destruction, or to treat this tragedy as a tourist attraction, so I can only speak from memory (an erroneous source in itself). And it is absolutely incomprehensible that one year plus some months later that little of the aid from governments in the region, the UN funds, and NGO assistance have gotten back to the survivors. These people survived 20 years of conflict, the 'Big Wave' and now face the challenges of international 'benevolence' and 'aid capitalism.' For sure, this humanitarian disaster received the largest amount of aid and international outreach in history, but the methods of distribution, monitoring funds, local consultation and ethics have been grotesque, imperial, shady to say the least.

For instance, it's a massive mistake to have handed over the billions of funds to a corrupt, warmongering government, who's already misspent monies, in part on military expenses (whoah - how familiar is this experience in the western hemisphere?). More fundamental are the inherent flaws of the international aid architecture, that do not take in the very particular circumstances within the country needing the relief. Namely, they do not take in the complexities of aid in post-conflict recovery or on using the established networks of organisations already working in the country/region. Instead, alot of organisations inexperienced in Sri Lanka flooded the affected areas with their well-meanings and good intentions, but contributed to chaos and poor decisions. Many foreign volunteers do not speak the language and treat survivors with paternalism rather than listening with compassion. According to Sri Lankan social scientist, Dr. Darini Rajasingham Senanayake, "Each one of their air tickets and per diems may have paid for the rebuilding of a couple of tsunami-devastated homes." It does more good to employ/mobilise the underemployed university graduates, who may have a more sound grasp on the local situation, to carry out the relief work. Some of the negative reprecussions from the uncoordinated or ill-advised programmes can be seen as a disjuncture between state control of immediate international funds and its own agenda, and community knowledge and development initiatives.

One of the most gruesome outcomes from lack of coordination, includes how the looming possibility of returning to conflict, created a demand for LTTE recruits. Many children orphaned by the tsunami since have been recruited as child soldiers and trafficked into sex work to cater to the foreign paedophiles. In addition, areas that cater more to business and tourism received more immediate attention and relief in order to quickly resume one of the main service industries on the island. Approximately 55,000 temporary houses have been built in southern region but only one around Jaffna. Tamil people often face added, unjust hardships by the Government of Sri Lanka, who penalise survivors for being in the 'wrong' part of the country, not on the Singhalese side. Preventing relief agencies to come into the north and east by the LTTE, as well as the government's poor decisions not to focus on largely Tamil communities north, could exacerbate the teetering conflict. Moreover, while temporary housing is more available, permanent housing and strategies for long term recovery are still unfolding.

It is clear that the enormous funds pouring in internationally need to be held accountable to the survivors and distribution in Sri Lanka requires more effective monitoring. UN agencies have good transparency in terms of their funding expenditure, but bureacracy has tied up alot of the aid, instead of getting back to people (UN is angrily frowned upon here - best not to mention affiliation). As well, using aid to attain political ends exacerbates the conflict and hardships endured by the affected communities. How do we link established organisations working here to (larger, international) organisations that have the capabilities to expand project operations so that these juggernauts of relief and recovery can really manage sustained development?

In reference to article by:
Dr. Darini Rajasingham Senanayake."Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Management: Lessons from Sri Lanka and India" ASEAN Roundtable 2005: The Asian Tsunami: Implications for Regional Development and Security, Institute of Southeast Asia Studies, Singapore

Kokila

2006-03-09T22:23:00.000+06:00

Named for the white bird that perches on water buffalo in rice paddies, she is a a woman, my age, working as a maid for my landlords. Her sister previously worked here, but being only 16, she became too homesick to work and returned back to tea country to send Kokila in her place. Both young women share huge smiles, yet deep sadness in their eyes. Kokila collects newspaper clippings of Tamil Bollywood stars and keeps them in a scrap book, and she tracks all the soap operas on telly. She can explain (using chef and body language to interpret) all the gossip in Bollywood and that one actor, Veejay, is visiting Colombo in June. But she cannot cook well and has no interest in doing housework. Nason, the chef, resents incompetence and other workers for their 'bad' manners, most likely because he's the only one who works 18 hrs a day with little rest. He has been trying to get rid of Kokila for some time and I came to realise it is because she sells sex to one of my beastly neighbours.

The landlords found out that one of the gardners pimps her out, so now they try to keep their eyes on her. However, they are lawyers and are often not around. I tried to reason with the chef that she could need the money for her young child, who is being taken care of by her family. Or that she could care less about the domestic work when she is given gifts, clothes, jewelry, money for her other informal services. Or that she seeks to be with men because she had abusive, alcoholic father (common case particularly in rural communities, like the tea village where she grew up). But Nason insists that she is a bad person and should be thrown out on the streets. Meanwhile, the men, like the gardner pimp, the obese beast, the employer who doesn;t intervene, and the critical gaze of the cook, are off the hook in this scenario. Hardly is their complicity questioned. Whatever Kokila's reasons for turning tricks on the side, why is it acceptable for these men to continue this behavior with no consequences? It will be Kokila who loses her job, and potentially stable income for her family and kid.

What I cannot endorse is the easiest thing that is done here, which is to ignore, put problems aside, look the other way. These class divisions and notions of superiority are most visible within the organisation where I work. It makes me nauseous to learn that none of the national staff have permanent contracts and that fast-track health care for them is only being negotiated now (health care is free for Sri Lankans, but some form of private insurance has more perks/quality). One amazing, overqualified colleague has degrees in micro-biology and human resource management. She was demoted to asst HR mngr without notice, while they hired another woman to take her position. It makes absolutely no sense; meanwhile we pretend that everything is fine, equitable, and that we are building alternatives. At least the private sector is more blatent about screwing people over for profit, rather than pretending it's working to achieve MDGs and improve the human condition. I'm quite bitter that some people in this field will trample on every human being for their own personal glory. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy most people I work with; just that management needs to improve significantly. Perhaps managers could be trained in human rights or something before working in human development?

Just a few threads to highlight the continuous hardships that many women must endure, on all levels.

But for some good news, in Rio de Janeiro women prostitutes are lobbying to legitimise prostitution by creating their own clothing line. Retired hookers design and sew the clothing, but I wonder if it's fair trade? As well, in a strategic essentialist way, women are banding together and organising to call for an end to the occupation in Iraq. Look out for these peaceniks in a town near you. So yeah, can we get on with it please?

it's impossible to reform things from the inside when these institutions are just bureaucratic nightmares...

2006-03-04T14:27:00.000+06:00

how do we/i work to change unfair aspects of the world, like trading rules, when the inside of these development institutions are soulless bureaucratic dustbins? just alot of shuffling papers and backstabbing politics amongst economists. meanwhile the revolutions, coups (i.e. latin american, filipino, nepali) and other social movements are filled with similar, perpetual inequalities and discriminations, particularly that women's work and social networks are unrecognised and used by dominant elites (read: men) to give them a leg up on seats of power. im waiting for a revolution by cats.

STATEMENT FROM WOMEN HOUSEWIVES WORKERS IN THE HOME TO OUR PRESIDENT
HUGO CHAVEZ FRIAS - 4 February 2006

We see the need to issue this statement given the imminent emergency
of having to spend another year without a budget or begging here and
there for resources in order to guarantee people's participation in
the direct exercise of participatory democracy and grassroots
sovereignty.

We have been working for five years as the Red Popular de Los Altos
Mirandinos (Grassroots Network of Los Altos), Miranda State,
Municipality of Guaicaipuro, with connections in Aragua, La Guaira,
M・ida and Valencia spreading information on the creation of the Land
Committees Urban and Rural, and the setting up of the Mesas Tecnicas
Locales (Local Technical Committees). In those five years we have
designed and carried out property surveys, population censuses,
socioeconomic studies, and workshops with their own methodology for
topography, seismology and urban planning. Our experience also
includes working with the Consejo de Economia Social (the Social
Economic Council) since its creation three years ago. There we worked
on developing projects and budgets, and on selecting projects and
studying their feasibility within the communities. We were also
involved in the creation of the Red de Usuarias y Aliadas del Banco de
Desarrollo de la Mujer (Network of Users and Allies of the Women's
Development Bank) Banmujer. There too we carried out a selection
process using a socioeconomic study to locate the women with the
greatest need. We gave workshops on ideological training for the
creation of a caring economy. From this selection process we developed
the criteria used to deliver 120 credits between 2003-04 and to locate
the Casas de Alimentacion (soup kitchens) and the Mercal
(State-subsidized markets for people on low incomes). The Land
Committee welcomed and found a location for the Mission Barrio Adentro
(the healthcare mission based in low-income neighbourhoods) and
supported the Cuban doctors while they set up the grassroots clinics.
We also provided support for the Consejos Comunales (Community
Councils) as they were being set up, and advised on the creation of
projects that were going to be selected for the Plan de Obras
Municipales (the Municipal Works Plan).

The great majority - between 70 and 80 per cent of participants
nationwide - are women housewives workers in the home who have become
community leaders and defenders of this revolution, this participatory
democracy. We are the women who are doing the work of carrying forward
this revolution. We work for free and we are treated with contempt by
the State bureaucracy - they take advantage of us by using our work to
project themselves politically and give themselves credibility,
appropriating the few resources we have managed to get after many
battles, and which they have the nerve to pretend to administer and
even operate. This has brought disappointment and despair to those who
believe in the President but not in the majority of those who surround
him. By stealing our projects and the resources needed to carry them
out, and denying our ability as grassroots organizations, they are
stealing the revolution and this unique and unrepeatable opportunity
to change the world.

The President announced yesterday that, as part of the redistribution
of the oil revenue, the work done in the home by women heads of
household - starting with those who live in extreme poverty - would be
recognized with a housewife's pension equivalent to 80% of the minimum
wage (that is 372.000 Bolivars a month) which would be paid to 100,000
women during the first semester of this year and to an additional
100,000 in the second semester. The President said that this would be
administered by the Ministry of Work and the Ministry of Popular
Economy, and that the beneficiaries would be put forward by the
Consejos Comunales and the Juntas Parroquiales (Parish Boards) which
would take account of the Land, Water and Health Committees and other
community organizations for monitoring and accountability. In order to
ensure that this economic recognition - which the women of Venezuela
and the world have fought so hard for - is delivered directly to those
entitled to it and doesn't stay in the pockets of bloodsucking
bureaucrats who live off the politics business, and who discredit the
government and corrupt any initiative that attempts to deepen the
revolutionary process, we propose the following points:

1. We do not want the resources to pass through the town hall, the
county hall, the parish or local councils, or other State institutions
which divert or steal this money.

2. We do not want the parties to decide who shall be the
beneficiaries of social programs because they use the Misiones to buy
votes.

3. We do not want the points of reference of grassroots
organizations to be manipulated and displaced in order to impose on us
civil servants and bureaucrats who know little about our reality.

4. Nor do we want the projects and initiatives to be stolen from
community leaders in order to be presented by the councils or the
county authorities as their own.

5. We do not want to be excluded with accusations that we are
escu・idos [the term that refers to the pro-coup opposition] if we
make any criticisms or point out something that isn't working that is
the responsibility of a government institution or programme. Rather,
we want to be respected as monitors of social expenditure and
guardians of this Bolivarian revolution.

We base this on our experiences as grassroots organizers who have been
forced to beg for what is ours by constitutional law. As Land
Committee we delivered the project we had worked on for five years
into the hands of our President on the Al・Presidente [Ch・ez's live
weekly TV and radio show] he did in Guaicaipuro, Miranda state. On
this programme our President committed himself to providing directly
to our organization the necessary funds to set up our local technical
office for the regularization of the tenancy deeds of urban lands.
Yet, we are still begging for scraps from the local authorities and
the city council in order to function. We still do not know what has
happened to those funds. Rumour has it that they are being held by the
governor's office or the national technical office, among other
bodies. We do not know.

Another example is the experience we've had with the Segundo Consejo
de Economia Popular (Second Council of Popular Economy) nationally
with the executing body FIDES; we were elected by the people at a
meeting of more than 500 citizens organized in work sessions. We were
trained for three months and we organized a project for a centre for
seven service-providing co-operatives, and we worked with it for a
year and a half. Yet the funds (365.000.000) have been withheld to
this day, and despite our many requests we have received no reply. The
only reply we want is the execution of the project.

One more example is that of the Land Committee at Ramo Verde, where
for 45 years 26 families have lived on a military base which belongs
to the Ministry of Defense. After many petitions, the Consejo Local de
Planificacion Publica (local public planning council) approved two of
their projects, one to build roads and another for electricity. Today,
after three years, they still haven't had a reply.

These are just a few examples of a general situation that exists
throughout the country. It has many variants and it is wearing us out
in the exercise of our grassroots sovereignty, running the risk that
these revolutionary proposals may be lost and with them our
revolution. We cannot allow this to happen and therefore we propose:

1. That the funds destined for workers in the home be paid
personally and directly through Banmujer, and that the selection be
made through the census of the Redes Populares de Usuarias y Aliadas
de Banmujer because our experience shows that this would guarantee
that the money is not stolen, that there is no partisanship or
cronyism, and that social justice prevails.

2. That the pension is not temporary but for life because women's
work is not temporary and never ends.

3. That they include the recognition of revolutionary community
work as productive work that should be remunerated. It is not right
that we the women who, as our President has said, are the foundation
of the revolution, have to depend on the charity of our partners and
relatives in order to carry out our revolutionary labour.

We have not expelled the elite along with its caste of corrupt
politicians and its regime of terror in order to make way for a new
generation of thieves who take advantage of our revolutionary work. We
will not allow our dedication towards the communities and the
revolution to be used to build a new form of exploitation and terror
against us, our people, our President and our revolution.

Red Popular de los Altos Mirandinos, Edo. Miranda, Municipio
Guaicaipuro Tel: 0414 104 0858 Lamadre-romero@hotmail.com

Copies to: Nora Casta・da, President of Banmujer; the Red Popular de
Usuarias of Banmujer in the State of Bolivar; Global Women's Strike

SIGNED BY:

NAME

SIGNATURE

Pehahara

2006-02-12T16:58:00.000+06:00

Marking Navam Poya (February Full Moon Day), this massive, dazzling procession starts at sunset. It commemorates Buddha's announcement of his impending death at age 80. Because a colleague (whose uncle is UNP opposition leader Ranil),goes to Gangaramaya Temple, in central Colombo, we got good seats. Numerous elephants, decorated with sequined cloths, dance to the beat of Kandyian drummers, while hundreds of dancers each showcase their unique dances. Everyone is costumed, there are fire-eaters, stilt-walkers, swordsmen, and acrobats. The pehahara is a chance to parade the temple's relics (each temple has its own relics, from past Buddhist prophets) past spectators. Unfortunately, the camera died again so I could not take many photos. Besides it is indescribable to see nor can it be captured as strongly in photos.

Daily Journey to Werkk by Three-Wheeled Tuk Tuk

2006-02-12T16:39:00.000+06:00

School crossing of uniformed girls, all with hair braided; neighbourhood cow eating refuse (garbage disposal system); entrance to shanty dwellings; convenient store; decaying house from British colonial rule; man balancing his wares on head while balancing on railroad tracks; smiling family; materials for garment industry.

Outdated Photos from Thai Pongol

2006-02-12T16:08:00.000+06:00

Thai Pongol, mid-January, is the Hindu holiday for celebrating the Sun (God) and harvest. My landlords, Gowri and Shiva, invited me to their Thai Pongol celebration, and I woke up at 4am to help them with preparing the morning feast. Nason, the cook, and I made milk rice, vaddai (fried doughnuts with herbs), and juggery sweets. You must first sweep all the floors, to purify and get rid of all misdeeds, as a start to a new season. The other people who work in the house constructed a kind of shrine for the milk rice. You boil the rice with excessive water, skimming off extra water, until it boils over. When it boils over it signals that the Sun god has taken his offerings, then Hindus can begin their morning feast. People generally go to temple in the afternoon or evening.

And the view from my apartment building's roof, towards the sea. Rooftop Hindu garden where New Year's Eve bash, with mad Hindi music, was held.

Cultural Triangle: Anaradhapura, Polonnuwura & (Kandy)

2006-02-12T15:35:00.000+06:00

I cannot comment on everything I've seen during my visit to 2/3 of Cultural Triangle. Our group of 6 went to the first two sites. I would recommend looking into Sri Lanka's fascinating history, from a proper history/humanities book. Essentially, Anaradhapura was at its peak from 4-5th C BC to 5-6th C AD, Polonnuwura from 7th C to 13-14th C AD, and Kandy 13-14th C AD until colonial occupation by Portuguese, Dutch, then English. Sri Lanka was thriving when Europe was still trying to figure out sanitation and literacy! Amazing to see that at Polonnuwura there were hospitals, libraries, and numerous cultural centres. (But I have no pictures from Polonnuwura as the camera battery died). Truly a memorable experience, and I became quite fond of the island's wildlife (cows, water buffaloes, monkeys, birds and elephants).

Remains of Vessagiriya Monastery are now scattered rock debris, home to several cows.

At the Citadel, or Royal Palace, flourescent moss covers walls marking the perimeter of each building. The expansive site sprawls through thick, lush forests. The Mahapali Refrectory (no photo) was a sort-of dining area, with an enormous stone trough filled with rice to feed the 5000 monks in the adjoining villages. In times of famine, kings and nobility would also stop for a meal.

Kuttam Pokuna (Twin Baths)

2006-02-12T15:22:00.000+06:00

Samadhi Buddha, in meditation, with women praying. Previously, there were 4 statues total, with gems for eyes, but since have been looted or corroded.

Massive twin baths for 8th century monks to have their ritual ablutions. Urns signify plenty, and ancient water engineers constructed the water to run from a lion's head, which also purified it. In addition, the water could pass through the two baths between small holes in the walls. Turtles now live in the fetid, pea-green water, and vendors sell handicrafts and spices.

Maha Thupa and moonstones

2006-02-12T15:01:00.000+06:00

Ruvanvalisaya (Maha Thupa/Great Stupa) built by Dutugemunu (one of Sri Lanka's 200 kings within a millennia) to proclaim his victory over his rival, Elara. It is believed to house the remains of Buddha and is the most revered in Anaradhapura. He died before it was completed. Despite attaining control back from Indian invaders for a short time, the island fell to South Indian invaders after his death.

The dagoba is 'supported' by painted elephants. Buddhist animals represent the reincarnation cycles, so there is a significance that these elephants hold up the earth (dagoba). Elephants sybolise birth, horse (old age), lion (illness) and bull (death and decay --which was omitted from later Buddhist architecture and moonstones). Moonstones, at the foot of every temples' steps, have these hierarchy of animals, with elephants on the outermost ring. Vines or snakes, also carved into moonstones, represent desire and attachment to material things in life. Geese signify purity and wisdom. A lotus is usually at the centre of the moonstone, symbolising Buddha, attainment of nirvana and freedom from other reincarnation cycles.

Maha Thupa (Great Stupa)

2006-02-12T14:41:00.000+06:00

Third largest dagoba in Anaradhapura, at 55m, shaped in the form of a hemisphere. Prayer flags, each one with someone's blessing/prayer. Grey langur monkeys inhabit the grasslands all around the dagoba, harassing tourists for food. Also, we met other pilgrims, all 9 (including driver) fit into a three-wheeler. They wanted our autographs, as Westerners, so we exchanged addresses.

Buddhist lesson at Isurumuniya Vihara

2006-02-12T14:19:00.000+06:00

Within several caves the ceilings and walls are painted with numerous depictions from Buddha's life, and there are rather kitsch Buddha statues, in garish orange and red paints.

Isurumuniya Vihara temple at sunset

2006-02-12T13:57:00.000+06:00

One of the most memorable 'epiphanies' during our visit was witnessing sunset from the top of Isurumuniya Vihara temple, less visited by the throngs of tourists. Its eclectic architecture, accumulating over several empirical periods, houses bat caves, an enormous sleeping Buddha, and a maze of cliff rocks that take you up to the top. At sunset, all the nearby temples resound their chanting, so that they echo through the hills. From the top we could see the Buddhist lesson taking place below, by one of the fish ponds. Only when turning around to see the sunset did we realise the temple was built below the enormous Tissa Wewa, irrigation tank.

Embarking to Srigiriya

2006-02-12T13:38:00.000+06:00

Habarana Village Hotel's pool where I would start my day, in the isolated, extravagant, yet guiltily refreshing waters, with silver mist coming off the nearby human-made lake and dozens of rare, tropical birds, such as orange eagles and vibrant blue cocas, flying overhead. An indescribable way to start our climb of Srigiriya Rock. As we made our way through the stagnating water gardens and now defunct fountains, we tried to imagine the decadence of this palatial paradise, some 2000 years before.

On top of Sigiriya

2006-02-02T21:01:00.000+06:00

I can imagine that 2000 years ago the temple, with its massive lion's head entrance and steep steps, overlooking lush water gardens. King Kassapa dethroned and killed his father, then sought refuge and built this massive palace in 5th century AD, out of paranoia. He feared his brother and other invaders would seek revenge so he built this lofty paradise, housing an army, 500 concubines and loads of ministers and servants. He had a painter etch his concubines on the caves surrounding the rock. Quite a masterpiece, but fell 491 AD to Indian invasion. Near end of Anaradhapura's eminence.

Sigiriya cave drawings

2006-02-02T19:35:00.000+06:00

Spanish NGOist, Diana, with monkey. King Kassapa's pool overlooking Sigiriya Wewa (irrigation tank) and water gardens.

Lunch at Kandalama Hotel/Dambula

2006-02-02T19:22:00.000+06:00

The group of us had lunch at Kandalama Hotel, built by Geoffrey Bawa, Sri Lanka's renown architect. He managed to sculpt the hotel into the jungle-covered cliffs, overlooking one of the many irrigation 'tanks.' Amazing pool overlooking the human-made lake, similar to the one that King Kassapa had at Sigiriya. Then visited Dambulla in afternoon.

Chatting outside temples

2006-02-02T19:09:00.000+06:00

Dambulla cave 2, Maharaja Vihara, or Temple of the Kings, with amazing murals painted on cave ceilings. Everyone chatting outside temples, cooling in the shade, being taunted by toque macaques.

Dambulla with Toque Macaque monkeys

2006-02-02T18:53:00.000+06:00

Cave temples overlook plains towards Sigiriya. King Vattagamani was dethroned in 1st century BC and sought refuge in caves, and after he reclaimed throne at Anuradhapura he expressed his gratitude by constructing temples. Several reconstructions and repaintings of murals. Now toque macaques and a few monks inhabit the cave, but only the monkeys seem to pester tourists. They are quite aggressive, demanding food, and humping excessively. Regardless, Dambulla has some of the most beautiful views. French tourist with lovely orange skirt admiring vista. And Spanish companeras, Isabel and Bide enjoy the shade, as sun burns their feet. Must take off shoes when visiting temple.

Responses from WSF

2006-01-29T23:46:00.000+06:00

"Just look at the internal repression inside the United States, the Patriot Act, which is a repressive law against U.S. citizens. They have put in jail a group of journalists for not revealing their sources. They won't allow them to take pictures of the bodies of the dead soldiers, many of them Latinos, coming from Iraq. Those are signs of Goliath's weaknesses..."

"...the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), a proposal made by Venezuela in opposition to the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA), ...emphasizes social and cultural exchanges above profit-based economic deals. We can’t wait for a sustained economic growth of 10 years in order to start reducing poverty through the trickledown effect, as the neoliberal economic theories propose."

Chavez mentioned Christ, whom he described as "one of the greatest anti-imperialist fighters, the redeemers of the poor, and one of the greatest revolutionaries of the history of the world."

-from Chavez's speech from the perimeters of World Social Forum, 28 January, 2006

On Colombo Queer Parties

2006-01-29T11:21:00.000+06:00

A rash of dead grandmothers is going around; many people's relatives are passing away. So plans changed last night and I agreed to go to a Colombo queer party, thinking my last name would win my credibility for why I would attend when I'm straight. Homosexuality, transgendered and other expressions of sexuality are not acceptable in most of the world, with stigmas still present in Colombo. Several people I work with must repress their sexuality because open expression of non-heterosexuality remains unacceptable, and subject to jokes, harassment, threats and looming possibilities of getting fired. One young colleague cannot officially come out to his family or he would be ex-communicated from his well-connected, senior UN family. So he has to frustratingly 'hide' his true nature, most likely never partnering with another man for life. All the while everyone in his family basically knows but chooses not to accept it. In fact, in this international organisation's discourse they consider people who are gay as "men sleeping with men", like gay men (with no recognition for lesbians) just happen to wake up to a man in their beds! C'mon, get with it! It really is no one's business what people do in private lives unless they are abusing, maiming, raping, trafficking, paedophiling...

While the party was lively and energetic, there was an undertone of corruption, drug use and gang presence at this discoteque. I don;t usually like to go out as I am a huge magnet for freaks and skeezies. I certainly stand out with the blue hair and blond eyes. Still, it is fantastic seeing Sri Lankan men in sarongs dancing wildy to Westernized Hindi electronica and hip hop. If only gay people could be this open outside dark, seedy nightclubs. My attempts to have a good time were ruined when corrupt police chiefs and deputy sheriffs, in tow with half of Colombo's business investors, introduced themselves to me. They look the other way at drag queens dirty dancing with their police officers and at open drug sales/use, but they are fixated on me, the nosy foreigner. Apparently, I should try not to remember (implicated by strong, menacing words from the pigs) that police are in cahoots with drug dealers, facilitating the imports of these narcotics to Colombo. Or that they encourage prostitution in the casinos, ensuring that Russian and Chinese women cater to jetsetting gamblers. Many East Asian women face discrimination from local Sri Lankans because it is presumed that they are all strumpets. So this network of criminals and victims of crime is legitimised by tools of the state, and I;m sure you can find similar examples of institutionalised acceptance of drug and human trafficking. I imagine the World Economic Forum to be a similar ambience, with not as many out-of-the-closet queers. I imagine Davos to start their session of eating small children, after their workshop of fornicating Microsoft celebrities, to be commences soon. I truly hope the next theme for the Asia-Pacific Regional Human Development Report is on corruption and corporate accountability!

On JVP, LTTE and Sri Lankan conflict

2006-01-27T22:14:00.000+06:00

Residing in Colombo for the past 2 months has given me a better sense of the conflict and people's experiences with the armed forces. History of the civil war is complex and I cannot comment in full detail without laying the ground work for a lifetime's manifesto. So on a brief note, Veddas (aboriginal Sri Lankans here thousands of years ago), Singhalese and Tamils (both coming over 2k y.a.) lived tolerably together for hundreds of years. Of course, they had the odd conquest and land/kingdom dispute, but I think it's fair to say that colonial wankers exacerbated these groups' divisions. In the post-colonial era, after the limeys left mid-20th century, Ceylon had to sort out its national identity, governance, domestic economy, etc. Ethnic boundaries seemed impossible to reconcile, with majority Buddhist Singhalese pushing for a "united" Sri Lanka since the 1960s.

In 1983 the massive, brutal genocide commenced, continuing for 20 years. My neighbourhood (in Little Jaffna) had been razed and there were many bombing campaigns in Colombo. Several colleagues recall their pre- and grade schools falling in on them from nearby bombings. At one woman's grandmother's house, adjacent to an army camp in central Colombo, body parts landed into her back garden from guerillas' bombs. After depletion of resources and over 60,000 deaths and thousands more 'disappearances' the two parties agreed to a ceasefire agreement (CFA) in 2001-2002. With Bush's 'war on terror' (or the now-fashionable 'violent, homophobic, religious fundamentalist crusade against violent, religious fundamentalists') LTTE guerillas are now deemed as 'terrorists.' I think the extent of LTTE demands, exercised through violence, is to have control over primarily Tamil areas in north and east, to have fair representation for their concerns as minorities. Clashes between the marginalised and the elitist goverment. I do not have any ideas, proposals, justifications for this conflict, only that there is an unstable CFA now and pessimistic peace talks held in February. I just don't think a federalist government, like in India, could work in this small country. However, it is quite clear that maybe 15% of Sri Lankans seek war and that most people are aspiring for peace.

For the past couple decades the international community has collaborated with the many war-torn, post-tsunami areas and seem to be making some improvements towards a kind of normalcy. But if peace talks collapse people will be pushed further into poverty and it is likely the country would slide into bedlam. I am very confused on this issue and infuriated that the rest of the world does not even acknowledge Sri Lanka's fragile state. I am sickened by the news that JVP (aligned with US Republican politics) was behind the grenade attacks the other evening. Most people I talk to say it was JVP because the 5 grenades went off at night, when no people were out. If it had been LTTE or gangs it would have been deadlier. It is likely that JVP party launched the grenades as a fearmongering tactic for LTTE sympathetics. It seems that President Mahinda, for the most part, wants to negotiate for peace, but his political party is set on going to war. It makes things very troubling when LTTE is also hardlined and will not take anything less than 1/3 of country's land. It is also horrifying that US, Ireland and other industrialised countries are supplying both Sri Lankan military and LTTE with weapons and artillery. Will do anything for a buck and market for its Lockheed Martin manufactured arms...

In any case, daily life is good; I am safe, buzzing from the culture and happy with my research. Peace, paix, pazzzz zzz zzz zz z z z

I'm ok

2006-01-24T23:56:00.000+06:00

First rounds of grenade blasts in Colombo today. No one killed or injured. Apparently, unrelated to LTTE/nationalist government conflict, more to do with druglord underworld in cahoots with corrupt police. But grenades went off in a friend's neighborhood and spossedly near mine. Luckily, I was on my way back from Anaradhapura, Polonnuwura and several other ancient cities in the Cultural Triangle when they happened so no worries here. On an even more depressing note, 2 colleagues' fathers died over the weekend, actually on the same day as each other. Unrelated, one from a stroke and one from a long-time illness. They are inconsolable. In addition, Canadian leftism died on Monday, with right-wing, Alberta, anti-aborginal, nutjob Steven Harper getting into Prime Minister's seat. A good thing for Bush and cronies, a terrible thing for socialism, state-funded healthcare, preservation of natural resources, inexpensive education and transportation...WTF happened??!

Let's cross fingers that talks with Norwegians and Sri Lankan government go well.

Consuming other peoples’ sweat, blood and poverty

2006-01-21T00:03:00.000+06:00

I am struggling to live with the daily divergence from values of social justice, equal rights and respect for all, colour-blindness…. It is infuriating that management at this international organization tries to work towards reducing poverty and improving human development, but does not even acknowledge all the back-breaking work carried out by sub-contracted, informal workers. One business manager at this organization threw down new rules, so that the women and man who clean during office hours and provide tea twice a day must alter their schedules. Basically, seeing these staff members cleaning toilets, emptying waste bins or making very sugary tea is too much of a distraction for these top echelon managers. Now the cleaning staff must come to work earlier and stay later to do all the cleaning (instead of just during 9-5 work hours), but must also be on-call during the day in case there are cleaning ‘emergencies’ such as they have to clean up the sick from someone’s dengue.

It is appalling that there was no consultation with the staff, that they have no bargaining power to stand up for different work hours and overtime, and that they are seen as people who should be unseen. They are already marginalized in mainstream society, deal with their own gender hierarchies at home, and now must struggle through UN’s subjugation to the unseen, private sphere. Maybe if we look the other way at their treatment and lack of rights, we can continue to work on human development issues from our pristine, clean ivory towers? We will be so lucky, then, to have these women (who have their own families from whom they are delayed in seeing, by this new schedule change) clean our toilets while we continue to churn out lofty, disconnected shit. Can we talk for a moment about praxis?

Meanwhile, this evening I went with Nason, the man who gives me cooking lessons where I live, to meet his visiting daughter. His daughter just turned 18 and came down from Kandy for the week. Nason rarely gets time off, so it is a huge deal that he is able to spend time with her these next few days. Wani, the daughter, traveled 5 hours by bus to stay in a cramped apartment with her relatives. I was fortunate to meet her aunt, cousins and friends. Everyone speaks Tamil, so Nason had to translate and it was difficult to get an understanding of who was who. There were 8 young women total, all garment factory workers. They seem very proud that they have these jobs, and it is commendable how hard they work. These women sew the majority of the world’s underwear, lingerie, swimsuits and shoes.

After the phase-out of the Multi-Fibre Agreement, which grants quota-free, duty-free access to developing countries, several Least Developed Countries are indeed competing for shares in the European and United States clothing markets. I’ve been saturated with textiles data since assisting with the quarterly tracking reports for the South Asian garment industry. Most notable is how Pakistan and Sri Lanka seem to be competing on certain clothing items, with Pakistan driving the bed linens and ready-made t-shirts and shorts segments, and Sri Lanka having a strong hold on the other, aforementioned items. But the two countries compete against each other on other kinds of ready-made clothing. Makes you think twice about Victoria’s Secret and Bata shoes. (My own view on consuming other peoples’ sweat, blood and poverty, which changes constantly, is that everything is made in sweatshops so it’s impossible to avoid. But we can become aware of the work conditions, opt to pay slightly more for fair trade clothing, and normalize talking about these issues until all garment workers get benefits, decent pay and hours, health provisions, back massages…)

So these 7 women, 2 young (maybe 20-25 year old) husbands, 1 daughter and Nason share a tiny, 2-storey, 10x5 ft room with loft. About 1/4 of the room is divided for a Hindu shrine on a shelf, with a cheap, colour TV in one corner. Another shelf with spices and condiments lines the opposite wall, under the stairs leading to the loft. They use kerosene to cook their chapatis and curries, and drink disgusting Nescafe coffee with too much sugar (traditional drink here?). I have no idea where their toilet or bathing area is, but most slum dwellers do not have access to clean water.

Sri Lanka is still in a bid to privatize its water, so it is likely that clean water will become increasingly difficult to access for urban dwellers. In the dilapidated building scores of families live in cramped rooms, stacked on top of each other. I saw a few young girls with their mothers being younger than me, who most likely do not go to school. Another friend told me that most people living in this section of Colombo, come down from Jaffna and Batticola to sell cheap imported goods in Pettah’s maze of markets.

I tried to find out more about these young women’s work life and answers to how they stay so happy, but much will remain unsaid until I improve my Tamil. You can talk about vegetables for only so long! I am defnly the oddity and I think I surprised my hosts when I told them I cannot really sew. On the other hand, they make and wear really pretty dresses from simple, cotton prints. They even gave me a strand of beads, somewhat feeling sorry for me that I did not have (or wear) gold necklaces despite my apparent wealth. They were very glamorous young women with their own gold strands, ear cuffs, nose rings and anklets.

So while at work I have to commend Sri Lankan garment workers for keeping the industry afloat after the quota phase out, I cannot help but be frustrated that the lived realities of these women have not changed and possibly has gotten worse. I don’t even think colleagues who visited factories in their case study countries even went to the workers’ homes, relying on the forged experiences within a factory compound. Instead, we should commend garment workers for carrying the industry, their communities and families…Maybe I will find other ways to cope with this duplicity and fraudulence. (However, I am concerned that I spoke out of line to management about the cleaning staff decision ---we’ll see soon enough if I am barred from this organization for my audacity…)

Where does Supramani sleep when it rains?

2006-01-21T00:01:00.000+06:00

Treatment as a foreigner is heavy baggage to carry around. On the one hand, service is expedited, people are smiling extra wide and you easily pass through military checkpoints. On the other, people assume you have loads of cash to hand out, so you get special and differential treatment with pricing. At market it is impossible to bargain fairly, so I expect to pay at least 30% more. I am lucky to have met a fantastic, kind Muslim Tamil man who has become a friend and my regular three-wheeler driver. Zulfi speaks good English and has taught me loads about Sri Lanka, especially about what is a fair price. Indeed, Sri Lanka has lagged behind Singapore and Thailand in terms of development, with poverty rate rising concurrently with the heightened conflict (and many jaded youth join armed forces on one side or the other, for consistent income), but money certainly isn’t everything.

It seems natural as a Westerner to offer cash to people who teach you a language or to cook or to show you around. Perhaps it’s just in the West where these niche services have become commodified and turned into small-scale industries. But it is more of an insult to offer people money for these kinds of lessons in life because showing genuine interest and being courteous are often more valuable. Where I live there are several people working as domestic staff and I’ve asked the cook to show me how to make rampas, dal curries, barota, string hoppers and sambol. Nason speaks very good English and has become a default translator between the other, inquisitive Tamil-speaking workers. He is from the historic mountainous city of Kandy, his wife died 15 years ago and has a daughter aged 18. The subject of his daughter is very touchy, as he hasn’t been able to bring her up and she has been working presumably during her entire teenage years. Despite all my questions, with me getting in the way of his expert cooking, he is happy to explain to me about all the food he prepares. Learning how much time it takes to make barota: kneading flour, rolling into fist-size balls, twirling dough around in a manner that is impossible for this researcher’s wimpy hands, until it is very thin, then folding like an envelope and baking it on skillet for a few minutes; makes the food taste even better!

I have been very lucky finding this apartment. The landlady, Gowri, and husband, Shiva, are Hindu Tamil Sri Lankans who studied and practiced immigration law in London for 20 years before resettling in Colombo. She comes from a wealthy, diplomatic family and has connections in government; her brother is an MP in Parliament. They generally support UNP, or president’s opponent, Ranil’s party. Her upper crust lifestyle permits her to own a mansion with 6 apartments connected off the side of house for long-term leases and short-term holidayers. Gowri is an amazing gardener, very authoritative with her staff and clients, and threw an amazing rooftop New Year’s Eve party with Hindi music, arrack (local liquor) and fireworks (more like nuclear warheads!). Shiva is a devoted Hindu, and the most generous man I’ve met in a long time. He worships regularly at their household shrine of Ganesh, the elephant god of success and prosperity, as well as in their rooftop meditation garden. On smog-free days you can see the ocean from the roof.

I am situated in Wella Watta, or Colombo 6, a predominantly Tamil neighborhood. It is extremely bustling, off sea-aligning Galle Road. Bombay sweet shops, market stalls nearly toppling on top of each other, cheap DVD shops, bakeries, restaurants, lottery kiosks with booming voices encouraging the poor to test their luck, a culinary institute, a mosque, a Muslim Ladies’ College and a Hindu one, a few temples, a Catholic church and boys’ school, rickety seaside shanty houses, breastfeeding beggars, no-legged men on skateboards, teenage soldiers on duty, children in their starched, white uniforms, sari boutiques, sacks of every kind of legume and spice, king coconuts with the tops cut off so you can slurp the milky white liquid then scoop their flesh, and roaming cows make up my immediate neighborhood.

Although I love my neighborhood, a 25-minute (4 km) ride to work, and I meet many people, I am torn about my role as a tenant and observer of the poverty around me. A young man with a slight mental disability, Supramani, gardens, sweeps, runs errands and does small repairs around my residence. His work is integral to the smooth functioning of this home business, yet he is treated almost like an animal. Not to impose my outsider’s view on the situation, but I’m not sure why Supramani has to sleep on the ground outside the house. Monsoon season is almost over, but with climate change there’s been continual downpours lately and I wonder where he sleeps when it rains so much. This thought keeps me up at night as I sleep with one spare bedroom.

There also seems to be many young women who come from Muskeliya, a tea village, to Colombo in order to work. Dakshani, a cross-eyed, talkative 16-year old maid will be heading back to Muskeliya to visit her tea-picking mother for Thai Pongol (January Full Moon day). While it is a Buddhist holiday, Hindus celebrate by painting their cows and hiking Adam’s Peak. (The best decorated cow gets a prize.) It is traditional to give small gifts to friends and people who work for you around Thai Pongol and Hadjj (the Muslim holiday). I have both holidays off, so I may try to go into tea country to see the festivals. Dakshani doesn’t know Kamalam or her daughter who also works as a maid in Colombo, and says that most people in Muskeliya will be hiking on evening of Thai Pongol.

I grapple with life among people who are treated as inferior, when their knowledge and life experiences are far superior and valuable than I can describe. How can I sleep at night knowing that another person, around my age, must sleep out in the rain? By offering him shelter or extra cash, I disrupt the entrenched system of hierarchy and risk being booted out myself. Not to mention I’m not sure how Supramani would react. For the time being, I can only offer respect, small Thai Pongol gifts, a genuine smile and curiosity about their histories. But I am still revolted that I cannot outright revolt at this structure of inequality and persistent poverty trap. In my myopic mind I can only think of improving literacy or English skills, but those thoughts do nothing when you have immensely wealthy people desperately trying to preserve their nauseating wealth derived from the heart-wrenching poverty of others.

Xmas 2005

2006-01-01T12:27:00.000+06:00

Descended from Adam’s Peak after 7;30am, with the brilliance of plotting hot sun rising before all of our eyes. A whole other world goes to sleep or takes their Christmas Eve nightcaps, dreaming of what gifts will be under the tree or mulling over the family get-together. But in this Buddhist paradise of Sri Lanka, marred by previous (and possibly new) civil war hells, there’s just the hum of synchronized chants, chilly night air, and throngs of exhausted yet enthusiastic pilgrims. You have to climb about half a million steps to reach this nirvana, with Xmas lighting and neon shops, along the way. Because of this mass ascension it feels like something beyond any other cultural, musical or religious gathering, as you see wizened men with one leg or women carrying babies or middle aged shopkeepers balancing on their heads steel roof shingles or bundles of wood for their cooking fires. Can you imagine climbing about 2.5 hours a day, maybe 2 to 4 times, to maintain your small shop of rotis, Fanta and other snacks, for 500 people with little money, and 30 rich tourists who try to rip you off???! I don’t know how many of these hard working people maintain their good nature and sense of humor! And most of us in the West flip out over really small things, (like hand gestures in traffic). It really puts to shame any utterance of a complaint that I might have about anything in the world…ever.

Although I cannot understand a single word of Sinhala or Tamil, apart from Sutu (or gringa), I still know when people talk about me, even for a split second. Of course, there are way better things to talk about…but at the top of 2243m, this non-practicising Buddhist Sutu received sideways glances and giggling, presumably cos I’m there just to check out dawn. Instead I will most likely offend Buddha in the process. The hike is done at night, after Duruthu poya (December full moon) day, as there are less rains, it is cooler and you get to witness sunrise and the peak’s dangling shadow. When you reach the top you must take off your shoes and hats, and you can offer a small donation for a blessing, but must tap your head to the ground, 3 times, in front of Buddha. Mostly Buddhists, some Muslims and Hindus and clusters of tourists visit the top, which houses several food shops and a temple fitted with a large donations office.

Vistas from Adam's Peak

2006-01-01T12:12:00.000+06:00

About 20 minutes after the start of sunrise, it has engulfed the Peak and has begun its scorching 35-degree blaze. It makes finding your equilibrium long enough to walk down, doubly difficult. On the way down, I was introduced to a wonderful man, who is a shopkeeper on the peak. He says that usually the crowds thin and no one really climbs after 8am. So he sleeps until afternoon, then waits for supplies and the evening crowds. Many shopkeepers listen to radio or watch TV, and basically live up there. Because of the recent 40% crash in the Sri Lankan stock market due to economic instability and cautious investing with regards to pending civil war, many people from Colombo and other tourists do not want to travel to Adam’s Peak. For the most part, Sri Lanka is safe, and Colombo is safe as long as you are careful and have networks of support. Only the Northern and Eastern provinces have experienced recent violent clashing, such as attacks on 26 soldiers this past month. (I reckon it’s significantly lower than many casualties in American-led wars and murders within a state of similar population size).

thru tea country

2006-01-01T12:08:00.000+06:00

Anyway, this conflict and lack of confidence among investors, deters the tourist industry, which run a huge part of the country. During this kind of political instability, (relentlessly pursued by nationalist President Mahinda R.) all industries suffer. From this brief journey, the early-December market crash made clear that restaurants, hotels, guest houses, shops, small businesses, possibly tea plantations face decline, thereby adding to the unbearable level of poverty in the country. How to stem this plunge below poverty line for many people? Buy local? Give what you can?, (remembering that most people earn $35 USD/month) but do not attach feelings of obligation/pity/pride/generosity/etc. Giving cash to homeless people in the States is something that has a lot of these tags attached. Giving is certainly a personal choice, but how and when you action this choice, has serious political connotations. In general, many colleagues and acquaintances give only to women, children or disabled people because there is a stigma that most men would waste donations on liquor. And if you talk to many impoverished Sri Lankans they do not want aid money, huge relief projects or Brettton Woods infrastructure, but would like to awaken the wealthy parts of the world to their existence. Just highlighting some of these stories will bring attention to a few people who work extremely hard, for very little money and without due respect.

Ms. Kamalam

2006-01-01T11:34:00.000+06:00

While driving through the highland tea plantations, we met a few tea pickers, who gave us directions, allowed us to take a photo of them and showed us where was a nearby pila (aqueduct-like system to bring water down to workers’ bathing area). Some people in the group wanted a quick bath in the spring water to cleanse the day’s 13 layers of sweat.

Ms. (Thangaraju – family name) Kamalam, about early 40s with one 7-8 year old son and one teenage daughter working as nanny in Colombo, led the group through the tea pickers’ neat maze of black tea, and their cricket fields to a refreshing bathing spot. She and her fellow women pickers told us that they get up at 4am to cook breakfast on their wood-burning stoves for families, then get in line to be selected for work by 7am. After 7am they may miss the opportunity to get the daily pay (135 rupees/$1.35/day). Most tea pickers, strap a basket-in-satchel to their foreheads, where it hangs in the back so they can deposit their tea leaves. They carry long sticks to ward off snakes and before the day begins they pray to Hindu shrines at the foot of tea plantation to ask that they are not attacked by snakes. The pickers work until 4-5pm in order to be home in time to prepare meals and settle in children. It is unknown what happens with many of the husbands and fathers of these women, but there is a strong presence of women in the fields. The men I did see were playing cricket at the end of the day, bathing or chatting with friends. A massive contrast to the women’s schedules; despite all their work, the women still had time to show around inquisitive foreigners.

Most tea pickers will work on plantations their whole lives, passing on the work to future generations. The majority of pickers are Indian Tamils, brought in by colonialists as cheap labour. They continue to face harassment, racism and marginalization by Sri Lankan Tamils, residing in North and East of the country. It is interesting to note that most tea pickers voted for Ranil, the UNP opposition party leader, as he has been an integral part of the peace process. Tea pickers risked a day off work to vote for a peaceful leader, but their efforts were futile because Mahinda got in instead.

Ms. Kamalam’s mouth was bright red from chewing betel leaves, had streaks of silver in her black hair and exuded graciousness, modesty and politeness. I got her address in case I can write to her (estate employers would most likely translate) or send her some extra income, even $5 USD/500 rupees a month could make a huge difference. On the other side of the coin, why couldn’t tea prices be raised slightly higher, in order to provide a more substantial living to tea plantation workers? What is the role of fair trade tea in Sri Lanka? What efforts are made to offer higher skill training to future generations?

As follows:

Ms. Thangaraju Kamalam
Brunswick Tea Estate
Maskeliya, Sri Lanka

No Deal Better Than a Bad Deal!

2006-01-01T11:19:00.000+06:00

Anyway, for actual content about outcome of Hong Kong talks, a good write up:

(from Kathmandu Post, 23 December, 2005)

What is the benchmark?

by R.A.

"Hong Kong ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization did not fail like Cancun Ministerial, as many observers had predicted. However, the benchmark against which the so called “success” should be measured may be quite subjective. If “development” is considered the touchstone for measuring success, significant advancement of the cause espoused by the Doha Development Agenda (DDA) is the only measurement of success.

It may be recalled that DDA, considered truly a development round, did not only include several issues of concerns to the developing countries in the main text, but also issued two separate declarations. They were: “Implementation Related Issues and Concerns” and “TRIPS and Public Health”. This column starts with the success made on these two issues before analyzing other issues included in the DDA.

First, a total of 12 issues, which required serious commitment from the developed countries so as to ensure their implementation, were listed out by the first of the above mentioned declarations. To the dismay of the developing countries, there has been extremely limited progress on this issue over the period of past four years. Adding insult to injury, Hong Ministerial Declaration institutionalizes the process of sidelining this issue by pushing the deadline further to “review progress and take any appropriate action” to 31 July 2006.

Second, on TRIPS and Public health, WTO members agreed, on 6 December 2005, to adopt a permanent amendment to the TRIPS Agreement, which allows the countries with insufficient pharmaceutical manufacturing capacity to import generic versions of drugs still under patent. However, this theoretical assurance, which was provided on 30 August 2003 itself by the WTO members, has not been utilized so far by any WTO member so far, due to the stringency of conditions attached. This is not a victory for the developing countries – it is rather a victory for the Northern pharma lobby, which has managed to contain the “damage” caused to them by the TRIPS and Public Health Declaration.

What has been the fate of other issues? On the relationship between TRIPS and Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) the Ministerial Declaration has watered down the “negotiating mandate” provided by the DDA. Ministers merely “agreed to continue the work” and postponed the possibility of engaging on any negotiations at least until the seventh ministerial conference of the WTO. There is no sense of respite for the developing countries rich in biodiversity and traditional knowledge, which wanted to put a halt to the process of biopiracy through a mandatory “disclosure” requirement.

On the issue of agriculture the Doha mandate of phasing out of the export subsidies have been delayed at least until 2013 by the Hong Kong Ministerial Conference. Skeptics argue that by 2013, due to the ongoing reform under Common Agriculture Policy of the European Union, the actual reduction will be only to the tune of one billion, whereas the huge domestic support which prevents developing countries agricultural produce from entering the EU market remains. Actual gains will therefore be minimal.

Non-agricultural market access has been and will continue to be an area where developing countries are on the defensive side. The agreement reached at the Hong Kong Ministerial to follow Swiss formula for the reduction of industrial tariff would mean that developing countries will face steeper reduction in their tariffs. This could not only lead to deindustrialization, but also job losses in these countries.

Services negotiations, which became controversial even before the start of the Ministerial, saw a lot of wrangling between the developed and developing countries. One of the most controversial proposals relating to plurilateral negotiations had to be rewritten during the ministerial. Even after that the current text leaves room for different interpretations.

Special and differential (S&D) treatment used to be considered the backbone of the DDA with the members to committing to see to it that they are made precise, effective and operational. However, even after four years there is no significant progress on overwhelming majority of these issues, particularly Agreement-specific proposals, with deadlines set for the resolution being extended at least four times. As per the Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration, ministers agreed to expeditiously complete the review of all the outstanding Agreement-specific proposals and report to the General Council, with clear recommendations for a decision, by December 2006 – fourth such deadline fixed after DDA was adopted.

The only five S&D proposals that have been agreed by the Ministerial relate to those proposed by LDCs, the most important of which is the provision for duty free quota free market access. Even on this issue, developed countries tried to create a division among the developing countries and LDCs on the one hand and within the LDCs on the other. In the end, the developed countries agreed to provide such facilities to LDCs only on 97 percent of their tariff lines. This still leaves enough room for the developed countries protect their sensitive products such as textiles, clothing, rice, banana and sugar.

It is worth noting that even prior to the Hong Kong Ministerial Conference WTO agreed to provide seven-and-half-year extension to the LDCs to implement the TRIPS Agreement. This means that they will not be required to implement this agreement until 1 July 2013. This will partly help these countries contain the damage the full implementation of TRIPS by the earlier deadline of 1 January 2006 would have caused.

Similarly, “aid for trade” has been incorporated as one of the decisions in the Declaration. On the face of it, this appears a good beginning. However, it is not clear whether such aid will only be repositioning of the existing bilateral and/or multilateral aid or they represent additional commitment on the part of the developed countries.

Viewed from the perspective of the DDA, developing countries seemed to have paid a huge price for to prevent the round from failing. Their impeccable support to the multilateral trading system is in part a reflection of their obvious desire to avoid falling into the trap of signing bilateral trade agreements and compromise with the policy space they have been able to retain so far. However, sustainability of this approach is something worth analyzing."

WTO: Motley crue contingent, very little glamour

2005-12-29T20:01:00.000+06:00

…I’m still reeling from this experience and my thoughts are past due…

In this line of work, I have to accept the bogus line that trade liberalization is mandatory for human development, for reducing poverty, for promoting democracy. Yet it is estimated that the damage done to African countries by trade liberalization in the past 25 years, amounts to $272 billion USD (Christian Aid). Clearly, there are better alternatives for world trade, like keeping some protection and market regulations, (was not every US President on each bill a bloody market protectionist?), or getting rid of capitalism altogether? In addition, to bite the hand that feeds me, the organization for which I work tries to play by WTO rules and promotes liberalization in order to become a substantial contender with the other Chicago Boys. But I think it becomes just as soulless, misguided and disconnected from the world’s poor majority. Given that many of my political tendencies conflict with colleagues and people in hierarchies of power towards whom I must smile, I fear that all commentary and protest actions could cost me the job. (Hm, I’ll have to let you know if I need a couch to crash on…)

Indeed, the madness of the 6th WTO Ministerial in Hong Kong is indescribable and may contrast with mainstream media stories. For me, the whole process was very rushed, overwhelming and a strange convergence of activists of all kinds (whether it be dogmatic trade ministers, well-off activist tourists [i.e. Tallahassee’s Dubravko], or people who’ve fallen through the ‘cracks’ in the public eye and world trade sphere). I learned the Sunday before the talks hat I was to accompany the organisation, to which I am affiliated, to the flame-throwing debauch of the trade ministerial/circus Although I arrived too late in the week to sort out my security pass, and had to attend laborious, never ending delegation meetings with the development posse, I got a very good idea of how such negotiations take place. ‡US/EU shows up with their agenda and trade interests, does not budge and brings the rest of the world to groveling, due to their threats of sanctions and falling out of favor with ‘the only show in town’, the WTO. The talks leading up to 12-18 Dec meetings clearly demonstrated this. So none of us are surprised, but I’m more vitriolic about WTO’s farcical attempts towards ‘compromise’ –er, coercion in the green room-, civil society ‘consultation’ and NGO accreditation process, and all bloody presented offers.

It’s clear that within the talks, industrialized Northern reps ‘forged consensus’ with up-and-comers India, Brasil, and China, precluding ‘less developed’ or least developed countries (LDCs) from the talks. {Whose bloody terms of development are we using here? Developing to whose standards?}. I had the good fortune to attend several International Centre on Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD) panel discussions, which taught me more than I could learn from any book. I was able to observe my colleagues’ politics, how one manipulates themselves in this ‘talking head’, ‘fridge buzz’ arena, and how I will most likely fail out of this spectacle as I cannot play this deceitful, conniving game.

anonymous excerpts

2005-12-29T19:59:00.000+06:00

A few anonymous excerpts, some from people I know, indicating how fukt we are in building global democracy, fairer trade rules and eradicating poverty:

Concerning water privatization:
“water is god-given, but not the pipes”

“slums are a public embarrassment, so by denying them sanitation services there is the hope that slum dwellers will just leave”

Concerning aid:
“There is nothing wrong with the current global trading system, it’s all a supply-side problem…aid that has been ‘given’ has been squandered…so if the Integrated Framework [liberalizing your market and integrating deeper into the global trade regime] improves, it will be better than ‘Aid for Trade.’
“Integrated Framework is optimal, because it’s not just about trade integration, but trade development”
“Aid for Trade is an anti-market approach and LDCs are bought off buy this idea.”
“Aid for Trade will fail because most money will be spent for conferences/seminars/flying business class.”

Concerning international development organizations:
“[The one I work for] is not good at managing trust funds; funds should be given to Chicago Boy bankers, instead.”
“[In this organization] you can afford to be childish.”
“Constructive ambiguity is a good tool of diplomacy.”

Concerning trade:
“In trade we trust; trade for all.”
From G.W. Bush’s speech writer: “…Duty free/quota free [market access] should not be given to LDCs.” –aha! It shows how much US really does consider LDC interests, ha!
“The current GATS architecture is development friendly.”
From US ministers: “nothing came up [concerning agricultural subsidies] so there is nothing to discuss.”

...same neo-liberal extremism...

2005-12-29T19:54:00.000+06:00

While I listened to more of the same neo-liberal extremism, in the guise of being ‘moderate’, a global collective (simply against the current unfair, unsustainable trading system) merged, grew and exploded in the streets. I am in love with all these people! Plural perspectives, divergent yet in simpatico opinions, and a bit of craziness filled the entire city of Hong Kong. Thick divisions: you had aristo-technocrats hammering out draft texts inside Convention Centre, NGOs clamouring for a bit of action (potential funding/recognition/accreditation) inside official WTO NGO arena, academic policy makers losing touch with masses inside ICTSD, and throngs of everybody elses cast out in the left field of Victoria Park.

(anti-WTO baby)

2005-12-29T19:50:00.000+06:00

For the first couple days...

2005-12-29T19:44:00.000+06:00

For the first couple days I sat politely, crossed legged, and tried to tune out the drone of technical jargon, acronyms and W.A.S.P.s. Strangely, delegation meetings were held at a hotel right across from Victoria Park, but participants were completely oblivious to the color, sounds, art and positive vibes right outside the meeting window. I couldn’t bring up to colleagues how I roamed the park during breaks, as the anti-WTO movement was seen as an incoherent, inarticulate joke. I doubt that most Korean or Indonesian farmers, who held copious educational forums about rejecting fisheries in Non-Agricultural Market Access (NAMA) talks and objecting to patents on life, would see their movement in the same way. Who knows better, speaks better about trade policies than those people who directly experience them?

The S. Korean farmers were the strong face of much of the protests; their chants poignant and street blockades contagious. Most days during the week-long WTO meeting were punctuated by evening protests. Hong Kong shut down after 6pm on several days. Police were accommodating at first, until Saturday (clear that there still was no movement), when protestors prevented trade ministers from attending their dinner engagements. Protestors swelled in the streets, sweeping up bystanders, shopkeepers, elderly folks, creating a massive, uh, demonstration, in response to the stagnation around agricultural subsidies, aid for trade, NAMA formulas…The previous Friday night, trade ministers hemmed and hawed until 4am, and still, no movement. Hence, people on the outside, in the very periphery, including Heather Johnson’s ‘crack people’, took to the streets.

(Richard Gere...

2005-12-29T19:41:00.000+06:00

thinks Asian children are ideal for the textile and garment industry cos they have small, nimble fingers...)

I was lucky...

2005-12-29T19:37:00.000+06:00

I was lucky to have met with an old FSU chum, living in west China, who shared the protest experience with me. We tried to stay away from people who were on missions to get arrested (Chinese prisons aren’t in the cards for me just yet). But the surging collective engulfed you; you couldn’t really avoid the demo. The police were so supportive the first few days because they divided the crowd into factions, according to organization affiliation. Indeed, Empire has mastered crowd control…with its (‘less lethal’) rubber bullets, vile pepper spray, retractable batons, water hoses shooting out poisonous chemicals, tazer-shocking riot shields, helicopters and weapons earned from the arms trade…almost. Despite sectioning off the tens of thousands, a group of about 900 managed to hold strong against the riot pigs. Some may have been Korean farmers (or did they assume that role?), who set small fires and desperately tried to get into the convention centre. Trade ministers were locked in until wee hours; 900 or so protestors refused to give up, until all were arrested by 6am. Those detained are calling for urgent legal assistance!

Unfortunately all this did little good. Global Justice Movement folks ARE on the inside, do know the issues, do have alternatives, but obstinate US/EU continue to serve their steaming bullshite. Not to let the disillusionment about the policy and activist worlds deter me from my own path in finding justice, in some form, but it does seem hopeless, at least at this close range. I can only hope that likeminded people continue to work in these circles, perhaps towards dismantling these institutions of uneven power. Still, the divisions between movement members remain.

On FTAs, IPR, water privatization and tsunami relief donations

2005-12-23T21:44:00.000+06:00

...ruminations from previous Economic Journalists' conference...please excuse the flatulent acronyms!

Ok, so the purpose of this conference was to disseminate the horrors of free trade, particularly within free trade agreements (FTAs), to reporters. By stating the holistic, social implications of trade liberalisation, which in effect, pries open protected state services, such as health, education, water/sanitation, LIBRARIES?!, hopefully Asian media will better report the (dis)advantages of governments' entries into FTAs. Moreover, certain investors, like pharmaceutical/agro-business/multinational corporations benefit more from these trade agreements, while smaller, domestic industries become more vulnerable.

Most FTAs are made compatible with the World Trade Organization (WTO) framework, usually under the direction of US/EU. FTAs are very conspicuous political tools, in the best cases, and draconian, death sentences (i.e. to small farmers) in the worst scenarios. More often than not, bilateral free trade agreements (between two countries) exemplify unequal trade relations, as they give an upper hand to one of the signatories. Regional trade agreements are touted as taking into account plural interests, but you still see uneven alliances and divisions, even within a regional bloc of megadiverse countries. I know it’s heavy to debunk all attempts at free trade, but the current pattern is to benefit the already industrialized, powerful North through induced competition. Is cooperativism, on multiple levels, or capping development to some degree completely out of the question?

Within these FTAs, certain provisions are tightened, such as ratcheting up investment standards and strengthening intellectual property regulations. Some of my beef with the intellectual property (IP) system is as follows:

- legitimizes appropriated knowledge from local, indigenous and otherwise off-the-radar communities, which is without ethical consultation, equitable benefit sharing, due recognition, or any other, non-monetary incentives
- monopolizes control over patents to one holder, while most knowledge is built on previous, accumulated knowledges
- makes it harder for developing countries to access the tools needed to reproduce innovations ---(impedes technology transfer and generic medicine production)
- all WTO members and wannabes must adhere to same IPR rules or sui generis (self-generated system), of equal stringency
- does not take into account the masculinized institutions that created IP, nor the very different development strategies of different countries, nor alternative methods for protecting knowledges
- WTO TRIPS (Trade-Related Agreement on Intellectual Property Rights) is not coherent with UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), is not ecologically sustainable, only focuses on short term benefits
-in effect, promotes genetically-modified foods and discourages free sharing of seeds; massive blow to majority farmers
- not to mention, there are too many bloody loopholes (i.e. evergreening strategies), which continue to grant ownership of at least 90% of world’s patents to Northern Multinationals, uh, most in US
- the amount of wealth that is generated by IPR, which goes to US, (from Hollywood movies, music, software, & other copyrights), goes into very few, elitist pockets, is not duly paid to actual artists/creators but corporations, and is very rarely redistributed
- and so forth…

Hence, I’m not sure how best to report that United States FTAs' intellectual property rights (IPR) clauses for data exclusivity prevent Asian countries from producing generic medicines. How do I best synopsize that even US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is worried about all the stringent IPR provisions in all US bilateral FTAs with Asian, Latin American and Middle Eastern countries, because USPTO will be overwhelmed from litigation and enforcing patent protection? It already is understaffed and underresourced. It is interesting to note that even US FTAs are superceding national legislation to become these muscular, beastly trade agreements that pander to US (pharmaceutical) companies. I mean, Ely-Lilly and Pfizer are the architects behind the IPR regulations in the trade agreements, which flies in the face that US FDA or USPTO really want this level of stringency. Phoah! Who knew that these US government agencies, in addition to the generic pharmaceutical industry, are also digging their heels and trying to lasso these FTAs?

...On a side note…when studying services privatization, I learned that most privatization contracts (with big corps like Vivendi, Suez and Florida Power & Light) that were contested or under negotiation by countries before last year, were pushed through after the Boxing Day tsunami, as part of reconstruction package. However, in Thailand, such recovery deals were too expensive and people would not be able to cover costs for a waste/sanitation system, so some foreign utility companies sought compensation for the contract failure. United Utilities is set to gain $88 million GBP, or about 1/3 of all donations made by Brits for tsunami relief! (PSIRU 2005). What a brilliant way to spend relief aid…I will comment about some of difficulties in Sri Lanka’s reconstruction shortly.

Big Boss dancing ecstatically

2005-12-22T09:30:00.000+06:00

This photo is from the office holiday soiree, held at a local booty night club, Clancey's. Clancey's pub is notorious for catering to all the tourists, expats and government ministers' sons. These ministers' sons bascially live it up in the city, are associated with violent gangs, and literally get away with murder. There were several cases in the late 90s and beginning of millennium, where ministers' sons, doped up on hard drugs, killed (or their henchmen) clubgoers that insulted them in some minute way or another. Because of their immense wealth, there have been no investigations, so they are free to do as they please around the city. However, many locals tell me that if I go out with good people, who do not necessarily cause trouble or pick fights, I should be fine. Yet if I wanted to go clubbing regularly, I'd have gotten it out of my system in NYC. But adopting a Western-style nightlife is THE thing to do for most middle class locals. I've even been invited to a New Year's bash on the beach, but I'd rather see the country or hole up with my books...Anyway, the big boss is a very kind man, but a bit disconnected from his staff. Moreover, I've offered to housesit for him, while he visits his family in the States for holidays. He has a rabbit that I can play with, and a ludicrously large colonial mansion, complete with an army of servants. Most (except for security) are off while away. This is how development workers' live...secluded behind high walls, perpetuating the divisions between local staff and international folks in positions of authority.

My first residence at Cinnamon Grand Hotel

2005-12-22T09:18:00.000+06:00

(the ironies are blinding)

Twin Towers of Colombo

2005-12-22T09:12:00.000+06:00

Around Beira Lake, Colombo

2005-12-22T08:42:00.000+06:00

THE BOOK WORM HAS TURNED

2005-12-12T16:51:00.000+06:00

(from Schnews.org.uk, Issue 524)

One of the many things under threat from planned liberalisation and expansion of international trade in services as negotiated behind closed doors in the World Trade Organisation (WTO) is libraries. ’Globalisation, Information and Libraries’, a new book by Ruth Rikowski, examines the implications for the world’s state-funded libraries of the WTO’s most infamous treaties - GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services – see SchNEWS 378) and TRIPS (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights - see SchNEWS 420).

GATS is a set of trade rules whereby WTO member countries must open up their service sectors to the global market. Assurances made by the UK government, the European Commission and the WTO, that all public services such as health, education, water, housing, and libraries are exempt from GATS are in fact bogus. There has been a steady process of commercialisation and private sector involvement in all the above listed public services over the last decade.

So, state-funded libraries in the UK and across the world will be forced, in time, to turn into profit-making enterprises that will open the door to long-term privatisation. Brighton already has its multi million pound PFI library. (See www.roughmusic.org.uk/#four) Although the UK (under the EU) has not so far committed its Library Service to the GATS, this could easily change in future negotiations, succumbing to private companies searching for ripe opportunities.

TRIPS, meanwhile, is about the trading of intellectual rights, including copyright, trade marks, geographical indications, patents, industrial designs and trade secrets. Rikowski shows that TRIPS is not concerned with moral and humane issues in regard to intellectual property, but instead allows corporations to appropriate, patent and then profit from the traditional knowledge of indigenous populations in the poorest developing countries without giving due recompense.

So GATS and TRIPS will continue transforming services and intellectual property rights into internationally tradable commodities, to be sold in the market-place for profit. As Rikowski says, “In Britain today we already have examples of private companies running public library services (e.g. in the London Borough of Haringey), and many examples of public-private partnerships building new libraries. Coupled with the growing pressures on libraries to generate income and operate more like private companies rather than public good providers, the ‘commercialisation by stealth’ of British libraries and information is an everyday reality. When a country signs up its Library Service to GATS it means that foreign corporations must be allowed the right to compete with local authorities and domestic firms for the provision of public library services. This will open up the way for privatisation which could threaten the British public library free at the point of use.”

* The book’s full snappy title is: Globalisation, Information and Libraries: the Implications of the World Trade Organisation’s GATS and TRIPS Agreements (Chandos) or check out www.libr.org/ISC/articles/19-R.Rikowski-1.html

Drunken elephants create havoc

2005-12-08T07:07:00.000+06:00

The other day a herd of wild elephants drank fermenting Goda, a kind of moonshine?, at an illegal liquor den in the jungle. When they wandered into human settlements in Galewela district they created havoc and wildlife protection officials had to light firecrackers to chase away the herd. However, the elephants really enjoyed themselves, so they returned to the distillery at dawn on Sat, and ended up destroying crops in Wetakolupotha, Ulpathyaya, Narangasyaya and Meegasyaya villages..heheheeee!!!! -(from Daily Mirror, Tues, 6 Dec).

On Buddhist weddings, Slave Island, meeting the colleagues and post-Multi-Fibre Agreement

2005-12-08T06:19:00.000+06:00

Fri, 2 December, 2005
Friday afternoon I finally met the people with whom I will be working, only, because it was Friday the office was slow and many people were on missions or giving training sessions. Moreover, the Trade and Investment cluster, where I will be researching, attended a colleague’s Buddhist wedding about 10km south of Colombo, in Mount Lavinia. Apparently, this area has an enormous resort and according to the astrology, Friday was a good, harmonious day to get married. There were three other weddings that day and about two hours worth of traffic, hence, it took awhile for Yumiko and Riza to return to Colombo and meet me. Eventually, they collected me in a taxi van, which then wound around the bigger, human-made Beira Lake in central Colombo.

It is a short, 10-minute drive to the offices from Cinnamon Grand Hotel, and while there are few green public spaces, in terms of parks, the city is enveloped by lush leafiness. People spill over everywhere! Traffic is intense during the week and people carrying buckets, laundry, market goods and just about anything you can imagine, on their heads, weave in and out of the congestion. Surrounding Beira Lake is a reputable section of the city, called Slave Island, with a posh shopping and dining street, I believe Duplication Rd. Slave Island was carved out by Dutch colonists in 1600s and irrigated with the two Beira Lakes, in order to house their Tamil, Sinhalese, etc slaves. I believe crocodiles still reside in the lake, which had been used to prevent slaves from escaping. Right, so this now lush district is near the office, off Vauxhall Road. While the surrounding area is quite lovely, Colombo has significant criminal activity and I am advised to go to work via a taxi or tuk-tuk, or three-wheel, covered motorized vehicle. Taxis are cheap, about $1-3 for the journey. Riding a bicycle would be suicide, unfortunately. Not to mention, the often 40-degree weather makes it ridiculously hot to ride. However, in other cities around Sri Lanka bicycles are the prominent way to get around and if I get a moment to travel to Galle, on the southern coast, or Kandy, in the centre, I will look into renting a bicycle. Thus, for those of you with the weather conditions and smoothly paved roads, get on a bike!

It is unfortunate to hear the advice of colleagues that (Western) women should not be keen on exploring on their own (yet, it is common to get acquaintances to chaperone you). Of course, there are the typical tourist areas, like the shopping on Galle Face Road, the bizarre Pettah Market, the museums and government offices around Cinnamon Gardens district and the casinos where it is patrolled and safe. Perhaps I’ll visit the museums and Pettah Market, but I’m not keen on the tourist attributes. It won’t make a difference what I do, I will always be a tourist here, one with money to spend (the average monthly income for most people is $50 USD – I’ll make 40 times that). But I can’t help but feel sheltered and isolated. While commuting to the offices and to Negombo I witness the liveliness, brightness, hub of activity all around me, yet I am cornered in a pristine ivory Cinnamon Grand Hotel tower, sort-to-speak. It’s bloody immaculate in here –too much for my cluttered, chaotic brain-- so should I only be content to catch a whiff of activity on quick jaunts? Pea green canals, turquoise Indian Ocean mirror the azul sky, scarlet and orange soil -(I wonder what is the soil consistency and stratigraphy)- sidewalks shoulder the main roads when leaving the city, dusty red and green tuk-tuks zip all around me, saris of every color, and a million eyes fixate on me. Of course, residing in an ivory tower, researching the Cambodian and Laos garment and textile working conditions *QUOI?!*, does not help my paranoia and anxiety, which I usually have while in North America.

Anywho, meeting my colleagues restabilises me in a sense. This Regional Centre originally stemmed from a Asia-Pacific Bureau, in New York, and divided itself in Bangkok, then Kathmandu. With the present conflict in Nepal’s capital, this centre moved to Colombo. The two regional centres concentrate on different projects, with gender mainstreaming built into both. This one in Colombo focuses on poverty, MDGs, pro-poor macro-economic policies, HIV/AIDS, gender, trade and globalisation, and crisis prevention. The two main initiatives (in response to collapse of WTO Ministerial in Cancun) deal with poverty reduction and linking trade with human development. While it is difficult to gauge how effective are the Trade and Investment cluster’s strategies, it generally sends its core programme officers on missions to help train government officials and other development personnel to make more effective, human development-centric policies. It produces different tracking and evaluation reports, organizes training workshops (such as on gender and trade), and hires a network of consultants to work in the region.

I hope to meet my boss ‘Butch’ and others next week, or after WTO 6th Ministerial. I’ll have to be wary of a fellow American research associate, Mac, who seems starved to talk to an American woman. Quite keen to “show me around”, but I can’t be bothered. From the few hours I spent at the offices on Friday afternoon, I learned about some of my upcoming projects, so I will be very busy. Yumiko and Mr. R.A. (formerly a leader of a South Asian farmers’ rights organization) are finishing a tracking report, a sort of one-year-since-the-end-of-the-Multi-Fibre-Agreement (MFA)-in-the-Asian-textile/garment-industry report. (Apparently, it’s not as bad as what many development folks predicted, I mean the shut down of 50 or so factories in Nepal, only resulted in an increased shift to prostitution for Nepalese women! Some women have migrated to other countries to send back remittances, but they also risk trafficking. Still it’s not as bad as in Bangladesh?! Not sure how one is supposed to compare the negative repercussions…I mean, the whole design of the garment industry is pants…[er, crap]!). Right now, I am trying to find out more information about a couple of our case studies’ working conditions. We only have time and interviewing resources to investigate Bangladesh, Cambodia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and (maybe Lao PDR and Nepal). Cambodia is lacking major information about working conditions, hours, wages, unionizing. Not surprisingly, the Ministry of Labor and private sector development in Cambodia tend to gloss over such pertinent information, so I am trying to rely on International Labor Organization (ILO), OXFAM , UNIFEM and previous UNDP Human Development reports (…I can’t use Workers’ Rights Consortium monitoring reports of Nike and Gap factories in Cambodia?). My briefing will only be a few pages, but is due Monday. I am trying to work on it in between attending sessions of the Economic Journalists conference. But it is difficult due to no internet at this resort…

…I will try to post my findings in some way…or provide links to final versions that go to press.

Negombo

2005-12-06T08:07:00.000+06:00

...and two fantastic Pakistani economic journalists from the South Asia Centre for Economic Journalists, Ms. Shaista Malik and Mr. Amir Mohammad Khan.

...Negombo resort photos continued

2005-12-06T08:01:00.000+06:00

More Excessive Wealth on the Island Still Coping with Tremendous Poverty

2005-12-06T07:43:00.000+06:00

Despite some of this obvious hypocrisy and contradiction, I met some wonderful (and some lunatic egocentric) people at this training workshop. We have alot to do in edumacating the media about issues related to social justice and human development, namely that poverty is not a choice, impoverished people are not lazy, incompetant or unskilled, and that the paradigm of (economic) development predicated on tiers of technology, i.e. that agriculture -->garment/textiles --> industry --> services -->militarism -->supreme being --> nirvana, is unacceptable and grossly false! Anyway, below are some pictures of Dr. Saman Kelegama, Director of Institute on Policy Studies in Colombo, at sunrise...

Club Hotel Dolphin in Negombo

2005-12-06T07:04:00.000+06:00

Hotel where the organisation I work for in Colombo organized training workshop for South Asian Centre for Economic Journalists. Basically, the workshop intended to 'build capacity' of economic journalists on the economic, legal, technical and social issues relating to North to South and South to South bilateral trade agreements (BTAs) in South Asia; to understand the poli-economic and human development aspects of BTAs; generate media activism on how the North is screwing over the South on regional and bilateral issues; and to improve the flow of academic research to public forums. I can post the agenda for those interested, but I regret that I can't post the draft papers and Powerpoints. However, there were some excellent discussions on intellectual property rights and Thailand case, which I will try to synopsize later.

Room with View of Colombo

2005-12-06T06:53:00.000+06:00

I believe there is construction due to weather damage caused by tsunami and expansion of Cinnamon Grand Hotel, which is under new management. Inside there is an opulent dining room.

Initial Update from Colombo

2005-12-03T05:41:00.000+06:00

Wed – Thurs, 30 Nov – 1 Dec 2005
Initial thoughts, bloated and lacking fluidity from all the tea and champagne

After living it up for my last few days in New York by visiting friends, Lower East Manhattan cafes and flea markets, the South-east Asian exhibits at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and taking advantage of the mild weather in Central Park, I finally embarked on my journey to Sri Lanka. There had been some delay with the paperwork, due to bureaucracy at the human resource office in Bangkok and the backlog of visa approvals at the Sri Lankan Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In August, the Minister was assassinated creating increased security concerns and understandably, more red tape. I will try to comment the best I can about the current conflict in Sri Lanka, its politics and some ramifications of the newly elected Marxist president, (but from the advice of many close people, I will try to stay out of these politics, avoid discussing my perspectives on the American Empire whilst residing here, and stay as anonymous as possible – I really must learn to be more diplomatic about these things, and not as impassioned, without justification). However, I will attempt to work on other humanitarian projects, through volunteering, which deal with broader subjects such as relief, trade justice for small farmers and improving poverty alleviation.

In the meantime I have been doing some preliminary research on the Thai intellectual property rights (IPR) regime with respect to granting compulsory licensing for generic AIDS medicines. Could Thailand fill a gap for developing countries, by producing cheap meds and using south-south ties to get around US-led pharmaceutical doctrine, regarding the ludicrous 20-year patent monopoly rule on medicines? In addition, I have been trying to wrap my head around OECD countries’ financial aid for trade capacity-building (there’s that fun phrase again), regarding technical assistance in finding the best components of free trade agreements to suit least developed countries’ (LDCs’) development needs. Frankly, I think free trade will always be dodgy no matter how many flexibilities are used, but I’ve got to use UNDP development language and their acceptance of trade liberalization as effective in reducing poverty. (For a good time, look up UNDP’s definition of poverty…hm, there might be a lack of agency in impoverished peoples’ lives. Also, in my contract I do not think I can have conflicts of interest about the material, so no coarse, activist propaganda, and my intellectual diarrhoea will be copyrighted, or owned by the international organisation for which I work). What has been notable in the South-east Asian context in recent regional talks is the shift toward or larger attempts at south-south negotiations, that is, fulfilling one developing countries’ trade demands by seeking out partnerships with other developing countries, rather than continually relying on Northern ‘expertise’, supplies, etc. Or this is what I gather initially from the literature…

So from the start I am very excited about researching these different aspects and being challenged to become more familiar with the entire South Asian and Pacific trade context. Moreover, the treatment and outreach from the staff at this international organisation has been immensely helpful, patient and understanding. I think I will really enjoy learning from my new colleagues.

There are indeed a few surreal aspects to this kind of job opportunity, which I am struggling to negotiate. For instance, I flew business class on Emirates Airlines, amongst presumably wealthy individuals. I am interested to know who goes to Dubai for a good time…the odd yachting, horse race or oil crisis negotiation. It is very plush with chairs that massage, I drink champagne , and eat things called canapés . Also, I learned how to deal better with sycophantic airline personnel. “No, no thank you, I do not want to buy duty-free gems extracted using the worst kind of mining methods.” “Yes, that’s right, I’m young, on a student salary , and dress in jeans, excuse the offence at my very casual, thrift store attire.” “Do you not think that this lounge is wasting enormous amounts of food, water, electricity, and that genuineness is lost in this class type? Maybe we could turn off a few of these 800 lamps in the lounge; save a few trees by shifting to cloth (or hemp) napkins?” Not to be ungrateful or sarcastic (I am trying to leave these kinds of traits, commonly found in the West, behind), but I am not used to this lifestyle. I will no doubt have more income than most people I will meet in Sri Lanka and I will be able to live in a style of comfort that can be seen as absurd at times. Apologies in advance for some of my future brash comments, and I am still trying my best to deal with this change to a style of luxury by my standards. Moreover, when I arrived in Colombo I am initially put up in a 5-star hotel, the Colombo Plaza, now called Cinnamon Grand Hotel. I will send pictures of this outlandish ostentatiousness. I’m not quite sure how one researches poverty-related issues, the lunatic problems associated with IPR and best strategies for trade agreements when living in the lap of luxury, surrounded by other expatriates and tourists. We shall find out if this approach works best for contracted personnel at this large international development organisation, or reproduces loftiness and disconnect. I certainly look forward to when I can rent my own flat or maybe live with a family.

I arrived in Colombo Thurs. afternoon, greeted by the 400% humidity and 30-degree C tropical weather. From my first few conversations with Sri Lankan people, I think they are lovely, friendly and polite, and I think the women are stunning! An hour taxi drive into the city showed me another aspect because one must fight it out on the roads. Lots of cutting off, last minute stops and swearing. Madness across 7 informal/4 demarcated lanes, with a combination of cars, lorries, tuk-tuks, buses, motorcycles, bicycles, and pedestrians, with the odd train crisscrossing the highway. The road to the airport is lined with maquiladoras, housing Sri Lanka’s enormous garment industry. As comfortable as it is in North America to avoid discussing sweatshops (that everything we wear is made in them), exploitative labor or export-processing zones, you cannot avoid it here. They are everywhere, engulfing the city, and my taxi ride occurred right when many shift workers were leaving. I am not sure if the factories close at 5pm, or if a new shift takes over, but I am sure hours are stretched when factories must meet shipment deadlines. (Shipment deadlines, for instance, around back-to-school bonanzas and holiday hulla-baloo). At first I was in awe at the sight of brightly-clothed women, ranging from late teens to middle age, holding their long skirts, saris, and floral parasols, all walking in a strange parade, as they left their work. We know this is a women-driven industry, on the production and consumption ends, but is this also amusement, cute, engaging for men? It is interesting to see that many men stop their work in adjoining repair shops, restaurants and banks to hang around outside to witness this procession.

Something that is violently eating at me are the contradictions I simultaneously occupy. I am rich by Sri Lankan cost of living standards, but still feel like a poor student. I want to live modestly, but I must first live alongside the rich and famous (oddly, Michael Bolton is staying at my hotel, apparently catering to his large musical following in Sri Lanka—who knew?!). Already I am repulsed, nearly vomited at the reception counter, at the naivete and egocentrism of a couple other European tourists (and their derogatory treatment of hotel staff: that they should be waited on continuously and that staff gave them wrong directions on purpose).
I am also simultaneously too young and too mature. Sycophantic airline personnel, cluttering my head space, while hanging around me to satisfy any of my whims, indignantly kept asking me how old I was and suggested that I was too young to be in business class. Fair enough. Meanwhile, a couple people, including the taxi driver, questioned my marital status and why I am traveling alone. Apparently, at 24, I am too old not to be married and that I am a disgrace to my family because ‘they have to continue to take care of me?!’ No doubt not too many young women (all over) have this opportunity, nor can be this self-sufficient. And what I fear is that these contradictions – in trying to sort them out or by feeling guilty - might negatively influence my motivations for being here, for wanting to volunteer and for wanting to work in international development. ‘I will try the best I can…the best I can is good enough’? –Radiohead

On a final note, when I arrived in Colombo I had an evening to adjust, then I had to take care of the work visa on Friday. This weekend, I have been invited by colleagues to attend an Economic Journalists conference in Negombo, about an hour drive north of Colombo. It will be held at another plush beach resort (what?!), to discuss bilateral agreements in the region. I think it will be a fantastic opportunity to meet my new colleagues and learn a few things about the surrounding area of Colombo. Also, I have many travel ideas so that I can explore the country, (I would love to hike Adam’s Peak, and see pre-colonial palatial capitals Anuradhapura and Kandy, but I will most likely miss the annual elephant polo tournament in January --Elephants are a huge deal here! Lots of festivals and rites for celebrating them). I have also come across a couple awesome volunteer organizations. Habitat for Humanity has been a bit evasive, but I hope to get in contact by phone when I arrive. There is also MONLAR, a network of local farmers that is trying to come up with alternative trading strategies, which take into account small farmers’ concerns. As well, MONLAR facilitates seed sharing and provides some rehabilitative assistance for farmers devastated from the tsunami. I will elaborate on these possible volunteer opportunities once I am more settled and receive feedback. I should first see what are the demands for the UNDP job, as I will work at least 10-12 hour days. A lot less than I was spending in the Globn programme, so I hope there will be time for volunteering and traveling, which I could not do so much while in Canada.

These are just my initial thoughts as I begin this amazing opportunity. I hope to start a blog or photo journal to share with you. Hope everything is well on your end and more greetings later.

Missing you.

Peace.