[Marxism] RAWA report on conditions in Afghanistan

["Huibin Amelia Chew" <hachew@xxxxxxxxx>]

check it out!

--
Afghan Women¹s Mission
www.afghanwomensmission.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

October 9, 2006

CONTACT: (626) 676-7884, info@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

AFGHANISTAN LIKE A TICKING BOMB, SAYS WOMEN¹S RIGHTS ACTIVIST ON 5TH
ANNIVERSARY OF US BOMBING.

³Today Afghanistan is still chained and burning in the fires of both the
Taliban and the criminal ŒNorthern Alliance¹ fundamentalists and the future
of Afghanistan is in serious jeopardy,² warned Zoya, a member of RAWA
(Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan) five years after the
start of Operation Enduring Freedom.

Founded in 1977, RAWA is the oldest social and political organization of
women in Afghanistan, struggling for a secular democracy through non-violent
resistance. The underground women¹s organization has been the most vocal
critics of fundamentalism and war.

According to Zoya, the US ³just replaced one fundamentalist regime with
another,² and Afghan president Hamid Karzai ³betrayed the people¹s trust by
relying on warlordsŠThe security situation is critical - it is like a
ticking bomb.²

Afghanistan has seen a dramatic upsurge in violence in the past two years.
Attacks on US and NATO forces are on the rise and the rate of troop
fatalities is comparable to Iraq. Suicide bombings, a one-time rare
phenomenon, have reached epidemic proportions. Taliban forces control the
southern part of the country, while the Northern Alliance, allied with the
US to help topple the Taliban in 2001, now control the Northern Afghan
provinces. Recently, Safia Amajan, the head of a provincial women's affairs
department was gunned down outside her home.

RAWA gained international attention in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 for
their courage in exposing the crimes of the Taliban. However, RAWA warned
the US not to work with the Northern Alliance in October 2001. Today because
of the climate of fear created by the fundamentalists, RAWA members continue
to risk their lives for speaking out. Zoya, like all RAWA members, uses a
false name and travels incognito.

On October 7, 2006, Zoya spoke at a benefit for RAWA, organized by Afghan
Women¹s Mission called ³Breaking the Propaganda of Silence.² On October 7,
2006, Zoya spoke at a benefit for RAWA, organized by Afghan Women¹s Mission
called ³Breaking the Propaganda of Silence.² Scroll below to read the
transcript of her speech.

Zoya is available for interviews during her two week US tour. Call
626-676-7884 to schedule interviews.

* * * * * * *

'Five Years Later, Afghanistan Still in Flames'

[Transcript of a speech by RAWA member Zoya at a benefit for RAWA
(Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan), called ³Breaking
the Propaganda of Silence,² organized by the Afghan Women¹s Mission on
October 7, 2006.]

October 7th 2001 is a day that many believed to be the beginning of a ³new²
Afghanistan as the US and its allies started their ³War on Terror.² Terror
was unknown to the US until the 9/11 tragedy, but for RAWA and the vast
majority of our people it was the beginning of another tragedy for Afghan
people. Looking back to the US involvement in Afghanistan, one could not
expect that the US government would think in the interests of our country.
The US policy in the Cold War period has sponsored one terrorist regime
after another. All kinds of tyrants have been America¹s friends including
the Afghan Mujahiddin.

In 1985, President Ronald Reagan received a group of bearded men with
turbans ­ the Afghan Mujahiddin leaders. After meeting them in the White
House he said ³these are the moral equivalent of America¹s founding
fathers². In August 1998, President Bill Clinton ordered missile strikes on
Osama Bin Laden and his men in Afghanistan, who only a few years earlier was
the moral equivalent of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson! These
actions speak for themselves: for the US government the terrorist of
yesterday is the hero of today, and the hero of yesterday becomes the
terrorist of today. For the US, ³terrorist² has a different definition than
what people of the world understand.

Now five years have passed since the start of the US ³war on terror² in
Afghanistan, which was trumpeted by the US media to be for ³democracy² and
the ³liberation² of Afghan people. But today Afghanistan is still chained
and burning in the fires of both the Taliban and the criminal ³Northern
Alliance² fundamentalists and the future of Afghanistan is in serious
jeopardy.

Considering the US involvements in other countries and in the past 2 decades
in our own land, most of our people know very well the hidden nature of this
war. It was the US government who supported Pakistan in creating thousands
of religious schools from which the germ of the Taliban emerged and
supported Jahadi fundamentalist groups with billions of dollars against the
Soviet Union. Our founder, Meena, had long ago warned that empowering such
dirty and ignorant terrorists will not only pose serious dangers for
Afghanistan but for the people of the whole world, and the 9/11 tragedy
confirmed Meena¹s claims.

Immediately after 9/11 tragedy, the international community awoke and
started to talk about terrorism. The US invaded Afghanistan but it is
crystal clear that US did not enter Afghanistan to liberate our people, but
to punish its former hirelings and servants and a bleeding, devastated and
hungry Afghanistan was bombed by the most advanced weaponry ever created in
human history. The oppression of Afghan women was used as a justification to
overthrow the Taliban regime. Innocent lives, many more than those who lost
their lives on 9/11, were taken.

No doubt the war on terror toppled the misogynist and barbaric regime of
Taliban. But it did not remove Islamic fundamentalism, which is the root
cause of misery for all Afghan people; it just replaced one fundamentalist
regime with another.

Five years have passed since the so-called ³democratic² government of Hamid
Karzai has been installed but the depth of tragedy and miseries of Afghan
people still remain intact. Unlike what is being shown in the media, RAWA
and other human rights organizations like Amnesty International and Human
Rights Watch paint a very different picture of Afghanistan.

The large scale of corruption and fraud in the 2005 parliamentary elections
by the fundamentalists are clear indications that democracy cannot be
practiced in a country infected by the germ of fundamentalist terrorists.
The votes have been grabbed by the force of guns, money and authoritative
power.

Karzai turned his back on the hopes and expectations of our people and
failed to fulfill his commitments. He betrayed the people¹s trust by relying
on warlords. By compromising with infamous fundamentalist warlords, and
appointing them to high governmental posts Karzai has failed to bring any
radical positive change. Now we have a parliament full of warlords. The most
disgusting faces include Jehadi criminal leaders, former Taliban commanders
and some former puppets of the USSR. Those who ought to be prosecuted before
anyone else for their crimes against our nation are going to legislate to
the Afghan people! The rule of private armies of the warlords in different
parts of the country and infighting between different groups of them has
resulted in the loss of innocent lives.

Opium poppy cultivation has expanded and the government has stopped poor and
hungry farmers from growing opium but let the powerful warlords keep dealing
in the dirty drug trade. It is a shameful fact for Karzai and the US
government that Afghanistan now produces 92 percent of the world¹s supply of
opium. Even some ministers have acknowledged the fact that some cabinet
ministers are deeply implicated in the drug trade. Afghanistan has become a
Narco-State. It is a disgusting fact that Gen. Mohammed Daoud, a former
warlord and well-known drug-trafficker, is now Afghanistan's deputy interior
minister in charge of the anti-drug effort - under his command
drug-traffickers act with impunity.

Afghanistan has received 12 billion dollars in aid while another 10 billion
more were pledged at the London conference. But there aren¹t any signs of
serious reconstruction. Our people have not benefited from the billions of
reconstruction dollars due to theft by the warlords or misuse by NGOs. Even
a fraction of this aid has not been used for the benefit and welfare of our
people. Government corruption and fraud directs billions of dollars into the
pockets of high-ranking officials. It is such a big shame that the
government still cannot provide electricity, food and water for its people.

The security situation in Afghanistan is critical. It is like a ticking
bomb, and it is very possible that at any time a civil war will break out.
Women and girls have been particularly affected by the insecurity. There are
hundreds of attacks on teachers, students and schools across Afghanistan,
with girls¹ schools being particularly hard hit. In most remote villages
there are not even any signs of schools for girls. Hundreds of Afghan women
have committed suicide due to these intense pressures and hopelessness. When
the entire nation is living under the shadow of guns and warlordism, how can
its women enjoy their basic freedoms?

A large number of refugees in Pakistan and Iran are still afraid to return
home because of the lack of security, jobs, shelter and because of the
continuation of ethnic and religious conflicts among warlords. A large
number of people have even returned to Pakistan due to the insecurity.

Armed men from the ³Northern Alliance² raped 14 year old Fatima and her
mother, 11 year old Rahima and a 60 year old grandmother. The 30 year old
Amina was stoned to death; the 9 year old Saima was casually tortured and
sacrificed for her father¹s violence; Gulbar was burnt by her husband for
her refusal to go with her brutal husband; the famous poet Nadia Anjuman
became the victim of her husband¹s violence because he and others are
assured of the support of warlords of the ³Northern Alliance² misogynists.
Anjuman¹s husband knows that the law will not be enforced to bring him to
justice.

Despite the presence of more than six thousand UN peace keeping troops in
Kabul and other cities, NGOs and UN foreign workers are kidnapped in broad
daylight, and innocent people are killed in suicide bomb missions. According
to the United Nations, Afghanistan is a land that is facing health disasters
even worse than the lands struck by the 2004 Tsunami. 700 children and 50-70
women die each day due to the lack of health services. Afghanistan is a land
where hundreds of people die because of a lack of food and bitter winters,
just few kilometers away from the presidential palace. These statistics do
not even begin to address the human disaster in the rural areas.

Fed up with the hardships they have been facing over the years, 65 per cent
of the 50,000 widows in Kabul see suicide the only option to get rid of
their miseries and desolation as revealed in a survey conducted by UNIFEM.
The report revealed that a majority of Afghan women are victims of mental
and sexual violence. Calling it a bitter fact, the UNIFEM report also
revealed that the average life span of Afghan women was 20 years less than
women living in other parts of the world and child and maternal mortality
rates were still as high as 1,600 to 1,900 women out of every 100,000 who
die during childbirth. Afghanistan is ranked 175th out of 177 countries in
the UN Human Development Index.

Despite all this suffering, recently Karzai¹s cabinet approved a proposal to
reestablish the most misogynist Department for the Promotion of Virtue and
Prevention of Vice which was a notorious symbol of arbitrary abuses,
particularly against Afghan women and girls under the Taliban. President
Karzai claims that one of his government¹s achievements is establishing
freedom of speech and expression in Afghanistan. But the facts prove
contrary to this claim: Last year alone, there were more than 40 attacks on
journalistic freedom in Afghanistan, including two murders and several cases
of abduction, assault and imprisonment, according to the Afghan Independent
Journalists Association. Recently the Afghan Journalists Union also
complained of the degree of censorship imposed on them by the government.

Instead of relying on those people who may have brought the criminal
warlords to trial, Karzai appoints these criminals to higher posts. For
instance, this year he appointed 13 former commanders with links to drugs
smuggling, organized crime and illegal militias to senior positions in the
police force.

Apart from the meddling of neighboring countries like Pakistan and Iran, the
anarchic situation in Afghanistan and the people¹s disappointment with the
current set-up has led directly to the rise of the Taliban and the failure
of the NATO mission. There are many reports which say that the ³Northern
Alliance² commanders are selling weapons and ammunitions to Taliban
fighters.

The ³Northern Alliance² and central government try to point to secondary
issues such as the meddling of neighboring countries as a prime reason for
instability in the country. But today even Human Rights Watch and other
human rights groups reaffirm RAWA¹s point of view. HRW announced on
September 27th 2006, ³The Taliban and other anti-government groups in
Afghanistan have gained public support due to the Afghan government's
failure to provide essential security and development, and have used the
presence of warlords in the government to discredit President Karzai's
administration and its international backers.²

Afghans, all justice-loving people, and international human rights
organizations are demanding the trial of warlords and former pro-Moscow
puppets. But rather than being brought to justice, they were shamelessly
were offered higher positions and were given opportunities to find a way to
parliament with the support of the US and its allies.

The US government has put Gulbuddin Hekmatyar on its list of most wanted
terrorists, but his party has 34 members in the Afghan parliament who were
elected in an election which was mockery of democracy. The US works with
pro-American fundamentalists, but opposes anti-American fundamentalists.

Barbara Ehrenreich in her address to Barnard College in May 18, 2004 said,
³I opposed the first Gulf War in 1991, but at the same time I was proud of
our servicewomen and delighted that their presence irked their Saudi hosts.
Secretly, I hoped that the presence of women would eventually change the
military, making it more respectful of other people and their cultures, more
capable of genuine peace keeping. That's what I thought, but I don't think
that any more. A lot of things died with photos of Abu Ghraib. The last
moral justification for the war with Iraq died with those photos.²

By witnessing the crimes and brutalities of the Northern Alliance
terrorists, the foot soldiers of the US in Afghanistan in the so-called war
against Taliban, even humanity should die for Barbara and all Americans,
when they see their government support such misogynist and dark-minded
killers and impose them on the Afghan people.

Today the friends of the US government in Afghanistan are dark-minded
oppressors such as Rasoul Sayyaf, Burhanuddin Rabbani, Mohaqiq, Younis
Qanoni, Karim Khalili, Qasim Fahim, Dr. Abdullah, Ismail Khan, Hazrat Ali,
Abdul Rashid Dostum, Sibghatullah Mojaddidi and others - those who should be
prosecuted for their crimes against Afghan people. The US is relying on the
above-mentioned ³Northern Alliance² leaders and commanders who turned
Afghanistan into a hell from 1992-1996 and still are a threat to the
stability and peace. They are a threat not only to our country but their
cancer will spread out to other countries and all over the world. The US
still ignores the important words of Martin Luther King: ³injustice anywhere
is a threat to justice everywhere.²

Kathy Gannon, an expert in Afghanistan issues, justly states that ³the US is
not interested in peace in Afghanistan. The people who killed thousands, who
patronized the drug business are in charge of the country." Dear friends, in
this short time it is not possible to cover all the details of the plight of
my crying nation but I hope you have realized that my devastated country is
not free at all. We strongly believe that conditions will not change
positively and Afghanistan will not be liberated from the dirt of terrorism
and fundamentalism as long as the warlords are not disarmed and removed from
the political scene and brought to trial for their war crimes.

US bombs, B52s and the presence of thousands US troops is not to meant to
bring about liberation or establish democracy in our country. The people of
the US should know that their troops only serve the strategic interests of
the US government and make things worse in Afghanistan. Liberation should be
achieved by the people of a country and they must fight for their own
liberation. The ongoing developments in Afghanistan and Iraq prove this
claim.

RAWA has been advocating for a democratic and secular government as the only
cure to the wounds of Afghan people and particularly women. As women living
in this very un-liberated country, it is clear that outspoken RAWA members
who advocate against warlords and fundamentalism remain at high risk in a
country still controlled by armed warlords and fundamentalists. After 27
years of underground resistance, RAWA continues its struggle to provide for
the needs of the Afghan people, to empower women, and to work for democracy,
peace, freedom and human rights for all.

Clearly the main obstacle to the establishment of women¹s rights in
Afghanistan is the presence of fundamentalism as a political and military
force. When there are fundamentalists, there will be hostility against women
and their struggle for equal rights. Only in a society based democracy and
secularism can the rights of women be guaranteed. The fundamentalists who
misuse religion and ancient tradition to oppress women are still prevalent.
As a result RAWA¹s mission for women¹s rights is far from over and our work
continues.

RAWA has concentrated on raising awareness and organizing masses of women in
legal and social sectors, and increasing education and literacy among them.
We strongly believe that education is power and Afghan women cannot fight
for their rights as long as they are not equipped with this sharpest weapon
against ignorance and fundamentalism. With the weapons of education, Afghan
women¹s rights could not be ignored by any government in the country.

RAWA has asked time and again that those who are the real friends of our
people should support democratic forces and not our bloody enemies. They
should put pressure to remove fundamentalists from power and disarm criminal
commanders and bring the criminals to justice through an international
court.

RAWA assures all its friends and supporters around the world that we will
not for a moment give up our struggle for freedom, democracy and women¹s
rights in our fundamentalism-blighted Afghanistan. We will continue our
committed pledge to tell the truth, even if the pledge requires us to pay a
high price. Telling the truth is always revolutionary so we will remain
revolutionary forever. But it is impossible for us to continue this hard
struggle without your practical support. If the enemies of democracy and
peace unite why shouldn¹t the ant-fundamentalist and freedom-loving people
all over the world get united? Please raise your loud and firm voice with us
together against injustice and to defend democracy and freedom. To quote a
well known saying, ³the silence of good people is worse than the action of
bad people.²

Zoya is a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of RAWA. More information
at www.rawa.org, www.afghanwomensmission.org.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]


--
compadre,
if i injected my flesh with silicone
did hundreds of situps a day
wore lacey push up bras
got surgery to correct my Asian single-eyelid
wore subtle lipstick, concealer, & gloss
made my gaze bruised with shadow & mascara
wore dainty stilleto heels & flippy skirts
got some hips
would you buy me then?

hermano,
does market follow demand, or demand follow market?
i want to be the white girls of your wet dreams with million-dollar
prosthetic bodies, $40,000 makeovers, features imprinted on your cock
by billion-dollar industries

I am beautiful in my mind
until you choose them instead
slap my ugliness to my face

and you tell me you don't understand this kind of competition!
i didn't write the rules
of this game you don't recognize
you just follow the market, the ads, the art, the enterprize...
shaping the sadness of my sickness

Sisters, come together & incite
refugees of false dreams to unite.

inciteboston.blogspot.com

________________________________________________
YOU MUST clip all extraneous text before replying to a message.
Send list submissions to: Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism