Clinton Chides Turkey on Human Rights

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, chiding a NATO ally whose support is critical to American goals in the Mideast, said Saturday that Turkey must act on concerns about backsliding on human rights and its secular traditions

Speaking politely but firmly about the moderate Muslim nation, Clinton said the recent arrests of dozens of journalists and curbs placed on religious freedom were "inconsistent" with Turkey's economic and political progress.

She said Turkey should recommit itself to the course of modernization and embrace the democratic institutions of statehood. By doing so, Turkey could serve as a model for Arab nations now in the midst of revolt or transition, America's top diplomat said.

"Across the region, people in the Middle East and North Africa are seeking to draw lessons from Turkey's experience," she told reporters at a news conference with Turkey's foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu. "Turkey's history serves as a reminder that democratic development also depends on responsible leadership."

She called on the Turkish people to use their constitutional reform process to "address concerns ... about recent restrictions on freedom of expression and religion" and boost protection for the rights of minorities.

Those concerns have stalled Turkey's bid to join the European Union and further cement ties with the West. Mrs. Clinton noted that the U.S. long has backed Turkey's EU membership.

At a town hall event earlier where she took questions from young Turks, Mrs. Clinton criticized the arrests of journalists. She said the detentions have fed fears about threats to press freedom in the majority Muslim nation.

"I do not think it is necessary or in Turkey's interests to be cracking down. It seems to me inconsistent with all the other advances Turkey has made," she said.

Turkey's institutions should be able to withstand the scrutiny and debate that a free press brings, Mrs. Clinton said.

Turkish media groups say more than 60 journalists are in jail. The groups accuse authorities of using flimsy evidence to bring the charges.

Government officials said in April there were 26 journalists jail in Turkey for activities unrelated to journalism. Officials have cited the role of some media sectors over the decades in fanning support for coups led by the Turkish military, a staunch supporter of the secular system.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, of which Turkey is a member, says 57 journalists are in jail in Turkey, mostly on anti-terror charges. That includes people with alleged ties to Kurdish rebels and extremists.

Mrs. Clinton's comments were likely to encourage more liberal Turks but irritate Turkey's leaders, including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

A small group protested Clinton's visit outside the U.S. Embassy. In Istanbul, one man holding a Turkish flag staged a protest as Clinton met Orthodox Patriarchate Bartholomew, accusing Washington of "killing millions of Muslims."

Mr. Erdogan, long seen as a vital bridge between East and West, has worried some by taking steps at odds with U.S. and Western policies.

He insists that his ruling party, which has Islamist roots, is committed to secularism. But since President Barack Obama took office, Mr. Erdogan has clashed with Israel and opposed U.N. sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program.

During George W. Bush's administration, Turkey opposed the war in Iraq and refused to allow troops to enter Iraq from its territory, creating additional divisions over the conflict within NATO.

At the coffee house, Clinton also urged Turks to continue to embrace inclusive traditions and serve as the East-West bridge, without choosing one or the other.

"I don't think there is any reason for Turkey to shift from West to East," she said. "As an outsider, I have always thought the debate is a debate without real meaning to it because why would you give up one for another? You can look both ways and to me that is an incredible advantage."

Source http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304521304576449703956615170.html

Suu Kyi says Arab revolts give hope to Myanmar

The recent uprisings in the Middle East have given fresh hope to people in military-dominated Myanmar, democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi said in a BBC lecture.

"The universal human aspiration to be free has been brought home to us by the stirring developments in the Middle East," the Nobel Peace Prize winner said in the lecture broadcast Tuesday.

"The Burmese are as excited by these events as peoples elsewhere," she said, according to an official transcript.

"Do we envy the people of Tunisia and Egypt? Yes, we do envy them their quick and peaceful transitions. But more than envy is a sense of solidarity and of renewed commitment to our cause, which is the cause of all women and men who value human dignity and freedom," Suu Kyi added.

The address was pre-recorded in Myanmar and formed part of the 2011 Reith Lectures, a major annual event in the BBC calendar which honours the first head of the broadcaster, John Reith.

A second lecture by Suu Kyi, who was married to British academic Michael Aris, who died in 1999, and studied at Britain's prestigious Oxford University, will be broadcast on Tuesday next week.

Pro-democracy protests in 1988 and 2007 were brutally crushed by the military rulers of Myanmar, also known as Burma.

Suu Kyi was freed in November after seven straight years of house arrest, less than a week after an election that critics said was a charade aimed at preserving military rule behind a civilian facade in Myanmar.

In her lecture, Suu Kyi drew extensive parallels between the Arab Spring and uprisings in Myanmar, saying the revolution that toppled Tunisian president Zine el Abidine Ben Ali in January was particularly similar to Myanmar in 1988.

"In Tunis and in Burma, the deaths of two young men were the mirrors that made the people see how unbearable were the burdens of injustice and oppression they had to endure," he said.

She also cited the role of rappers in the Tunisian revolt, saying that young rap artists were playing a similar role in Myanmar, with some of them jailed after the monk-led "Saffron Revolution" in 2007.

But Suu Kyi said there was an important difference in that a "communications revolution" had helped the Arab uprisings, while in Myanmar it had been more difficult to get information out.

"Not just every single death, but even every single wounded can be made known to the world within minutes. In Libya, in Syria, and in Yemen now, the revolutionaries keep the world informed of the atrocities of those in power," she said.

Suu Kyi has previously said she wants to launch her first political tour of the country since her release, although a schedule has not yet been announced.

Security is a top concern for the party as Suu Kyi's convoy was attacked in 2003 in an ambush apparently organised by a regime frightened by her popularity.

The opposition leader, who turned 66 this month, has won international acclaim for her peaceful resistance in the face of oppression.

In 1990 she led her National League for Democracy party to a landslide election win that was never recognised by Myanmar's military rulers. She boycotted last year's vote, saying the rules were unfair.

Source http://www.france24.com/en/20110628-suu-kyi-says-arab-revolts-give-hope-myanmar

Challenge to Tunisia's secularism

Every Friday, Abderraouf heads to a mosque near Al Manar University, where he and other traders sell Islamic books, alcohol-free perfume and face veils displayed on mannequins.

Under the regime of Zine el Abidine Ben Ali they risked arrest. But since Mr Ben Ali was forced from office in January, Abderraouf, a recent university graduate, and other conservative Muslims have begun openly selling their wares to help Tunisians - as he puts it - "to know and follow Islam better".

In claiming their rights, Abderraouf and other more traditional Muslims are challenging Tunisia's secular values as the country struggles to reinvent itself in the post-Ben Ali era.

A council set up by Tunisia's interim government to oversee political reform finalised a new electoral law last week that reserves 50 per cent of places in electoral lists for women - a key goal of women's rights groups seeking to safeguard secular values.

"Islam is our religion, and it's not anything I want to hide or criticise," said Khedija Arfaoui, a member of Femmes Démocrates and the Association of Tunisian Women for Research and Development, two progressive women's organisations. "But I don't want anyone to impose the veil."

These contrasting views of religious practice reflect longstanding attitudes in Tunisia, said Sami Brahem, a specialist in Islamic movements at the Institut Préparatoire d'Études Littéraires et Sciences Humaines in Tunis.

During his three-decade rule, the president, Habib Bourguiba, a secularist, closed religious schools, outlawed polygamy and banned the Islamic headscarf in public places.

In 1987 an ailing Bourguiba was replaced by Mr Ben Ali, who jailed thousands of conservative Muslims after members of the moderately Islamist Nahda movement fared well in elections in 1989.

Within a decade, Salafism, an austere expression of Islam, was filtering into Tunisia from the Middle East via television stations and the internet, Mr Brahem said.

Calling for Islamic government and the strict segregation of the sexes, Salafis seek to emulate the salaf as-saalah, or "pious predecessors" - the first three generations of Muslims.

For some of Tunisia's estimated several thousand Salafis, doctrinal rigour is an antidote to what they describe as the spiritual ambiguity of modern life.

"Until I was 25 I had never read the Quran, never set foot in a mosque," said Abu Abderrahman, 34, a builder in Tunis who helps to run the mosque near Al Manar University. "Something was missing. I needed food and drink for my soul."

One day in 2002, Mr Abderrahman overcame his ambivalence and visited a mosque. Around him were men hunched in prayer. At first, he felt out of place.

"But whoever seeks and reads the Quran, the word of God plants a seed in his heart," he said. "Islam cannot be applied 70 or 80 per cent. It must be 100 per cent."

Since Mr Ben Ali's departure, conservative Muslims have taken to the streets to demand legal changes that would make it possible to live along what they consider more Islamic lines.

In February, hundreds demonstrated in Tunis's old city to call for the closure of a brothel there, prompting police to fire shots in the air to disperse crowds.

Two weeks ago, Salafis rallied and held evening prayer in Tunis's central boulevard to protest against a Ben Ali-era law banning the wearing of headscarves for identity card photos. Tunisia's interim government said the same day that it would remove the ban.

Such public activism has rattled more secular Tunisians, who often accuse Salafis of aspiring to impose a single brand of Islam.

"It's good to have people talking about Islam in public, since Ben Ali restricted it," said Adam Mars, 21, a medical student who prays every Friday at the campus mosque. "But the Salafis want to tell everyone how to live."

Others worry that if conservative religious practices are allowed to flourish, religious doctrines supporting violence will sprout alongside them.

In February authorities speculated that "terrorist fascists with extremist tendencies" had murdered a Polish Catholic priest, and secularist protesters rallied to condemn religious extremism. Police later arrested a local handyman in connection with the murder.

Meanwhile, authorities have barred the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir from legislative elections scheduled for July. In an interview with France's Jeune Afrique magazine, the prime minister, Béji Caid Essebsi, called the group's platform anti-constitutional.

While separate from the Salafi movement, Hizb ut-Tahrir similarly supports the strict application of Islamic law. Founded in 1953 in Jerusalem, the group seeks to weld Muslim countries into a single Islamic state through peaceful means.

"Tunisians want Islam," said Nabil Manai, a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir's political bureau in Tunisia. "They're fed up with the dictators and capitalism that have borne down on them for over a century."

According to Mr Manai, Hizb ut-Tahrir would impose the Islamic headscarf on women, ban non-Islamic political parties and partly collectivise the economy based on its reading of Islamic scripture.

Mr Brahem, however, said most Tunisians reject Hizb ut-Tahrir's style of political Islam, while the normal course of open public debate might actually moderate the views of Salafi activists.

"For example, Salafis are now obliged to express themselves through mixed-sex street demonstrations," he said. "Men and women have begun talking to one another."

Outside the Al Manar University mosque, the 25-year-old Abderraouf, who refused to give his surname, chatted with worshippers who passed by his stall while he struggled against the winds to keep his stock of abayas pinned to their line.

He insisted that his faith and his business were intertwined. "You can engage in trade that is either Islamically permissible or forbidden by Islam," he said. "I'm trying to sell what is permissible."

Then the adhan soared from the minaret, and he hurried towards the mosque gate.

"It's time to pray."

Source http://www.thenational.ae/news/worldwide/middle-east/challenge-to-tunisias-secularism

Alan Gross imprisonment reveals Obama’s foreign policy ineptitude

Distracted as we are by the unprecedented domino-like toppling of a multitude of the Middle East’s oppressive regimes and dictatorships – and President Barack Obama’s waffling on issues arising from our George W. Bush era interventions (should we try terrorists at home or not?), we’ve left our small Communist neighbor, the Republic of Cuba, under much less scrutiny than usual.

Raul and Fidel Castro have rightfully seen this as a window of opportunity to deal a blow to the United States – much like their “Axis of Evil” mentors Iran under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and North Korea under Kim Jong Il – by capturing an American civilian contractor and throwing him in jail without any guarantee of imprisonment length or trial date.

Maybe this is the first time you’re hearing of this – don’t be ashamed if you are, this story has not grabbed the public’s attention quite like the American nationals that were captured in other, more loudmouthed nations. Maybe that this captive, 61-year-old contractor Alan Gross, is neither young nor related to a celebrity. Gross, captured in December 2009 – apparently a good year for capturing Americans – has been wasting away in a high-security Cuban jail ever since, with little media or international scrutiny. Only recently, miniscule pressure from the U.S. forced the Cuban government to finally try and sentence Gross – 15 months after his detention.

The verdict delivered by the Cuban court on March 12 sentenced Gross to 15 years in jail for attempting to implement a “‘subversive’ program paid for by the United States that aimed to bring down Cuba’s communist government.”

Allegedly, Gross, a contractor for a U.S. Agency for International Development backed networking firm Development Alternatives, Inc, based in Bethesda, Md., whose mission statement is “to make a lasting difference in the world by helping developing nations become more prosperous, fairer and more just, cleaner, safer, healthier, more stable, more efficient, and better governed.”

It is not hard to see why working for this firm could arouse suspicion in anti-democratic nations throughout the world, but what actual threat could the Cuban government have received from Gross’ work to warrant such a prolonged internment and a 15-year sentence – pretty much a life sentence for a man of his age and health. Gross, a Jewish-American, was working to enable a small Cuban Jewish community access to the internet in order to communicate with other communities within Cuba as well as around the world. His work included the distribution of laptops, satellite phones and other hard/software to this tiny, peaceful and aging community – hardly a subversive revolutionary force.

Having recently awakened to the call of humanitarianism, the Obama administration has recently granted Gross’ case a small portion of their attention and sent bumbling foreign affairs flunkey, Hamas-apologist and diplomatic third-stringer ex-President Jimmy Carter to meet with Raul and Fidel Castro to secure Gross’s release. After publicly embarrassing and subverting U.S. foreign relations on the Cuban media circuit – appearing on television and radio shows to blast the U.S.’s Cuban embargo and calling for the U.S. to release five Cuban spies that are being held for delivering information to our Middle Eastern enemies – Carter hobnobbed with the Castros like the old friend he is. According to an APF report, Cuban dissident blogger Yoani Sanchez wrote, “Because he has the experience that managed the release (in 2010) of an American in North Korea, maybe he can do the same here, but the Cuban government is harder.”

Really? “Harder” than North Korea? Jimmy Carter did successfully free English teacher Aijalon Gomes, a Boston native, after Gomes had crossed over the North Korean border. Yet for what the U.S. deemed a priority – the release of journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee that same year, the administration sent the significantly more prestigious former President Bill Clinton.

Not surprisingly, Carter left Cuba on March 30 without securing Gross’s release, stating that he wasn’t expecting that outcome.

Cuban President Raul Castro and his venerated brother Fidel have made a mockery of American foreign policy. They, along with the world’s other dictators, are seeing the Obama administration’s foreign policy as a joke – as was predicted by Republicans before and after the president’s election. The liberties taken by the nations that President Bush called the “Axis of Evil,” had not disappeared as expected by Obama’s supporters, but only increased, a trend demonstrated by the rise in the kidnappings of American nationals by non-terrorist states for diplomatic leverage. Meanwhile, our actions in Libya, highlight that finally, humanitarian considerations are now factoring in this administration’s logic, although quite arguably, the wrong kind of logic.

But Gross’s crime of providing internet access to a small and marginalized segment of Cuban society – him claiming that he had not realized the hardware he was given was paid for by USAID – invokes another, larger problem.

Many have pointed to how powerful the effects of free communication via the internet empowers the population of a repressed state by observing revolts in Iran, Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and others. The story of the previous decade is of government infringement of such freedoms.

No doubt that the restrictions put on media, search engines and general internet use empower repressive regimes to control information to maintain their power. This is not surprising – leaders have always tried to restrict the freedom of information. What’s more appalling is that the post-President Bush U.S. has not challenged any of these present incursions when such power is being used by nations to avoid the fate of their fallen comrades. In a recent opinion column, Washington Post columnist and Fox News contributor Charles Krauthammer slammed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for a statement describing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, sounding more like Hugo Chavez than an American dignitary. “Many of the members of Congress of both parties who have gone to Syria in recent months have said they believe he’s a reformer.”

If suppression of free media, restrictions on internet use and violent crackdowns on protesters are Clinton’s idea of reform, then either the Democrats have allied with the Arab Socialist Ba’ath party or the Obama administration thinks Bashar’s actions could teach them to handle their Tea Party opponents. As Krauthammer and others point out, the current administration is displaying a very flawed moral logic.

While President Obama basks in the limelight of the false coalition he built against Qaddafi on shaky moral and constitutional grounds, Gross remains imprisoned and in poor health, wondering whether he will ever see his family again, especially his 88-year-old mother and 26-year-old daughter who are both suffering from cancer. The lack of outrage and sympathy being shown by the administration is vile and contemptible. Alan Gross, his family and supporters can only hope that the media will awake to better expose his case so that the American public can once again strong-arm Obama into action as it did in the previous election.

Source http://dailycollegian.com/2011/04/05/alan-gross-imprisonment-reveals-obama%E2%80%99s-foreign-policy-ineptitude/

Tunisia Won't Use Islamist-Led Turkey as a Model, Rebel Leader Says

Holding up Turkey as a model would not be the right approach for Tunisia, which seeks a democracy of its own, a key opposition leader who is seen as a future president of that country, said Monday.

"The Islamic party in Tunisia looks at the ruling Turkey's Justice and Development Party (AKP) as a model, but Tunisia doesn't want to follow a model, we want to construct our own democracy," Ahmed Nejib Chebbi told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review in an interview after speaking at a roundtable discussion organized by Turkish Policy Quarterly magazine.

"Tunisian society is very sympathic towards Turkey, not just historically, but also because of its economic success and because of the new role that Turkey is playing in the international scene," Chebbi said, as his country paves the way to a new constitutional assembly in June.

The whole world follows Turkey's political agenda "because people want to see the reconciliation between political Islam and democracy," said the opposition movement leader, who is in Turkey to attend the Leaders of Change Summit being held in Istanbul on Monday and Tuesday. "Turkey's accession process to the European Union is very important for the other states in the region to see," Chebbi added.

"The process of integrating with the EU greatly helped Turkey in reforming its state institutions, however some European countries say Turkey is not European and they don't want to be neighbors with Syria and Iran," he said. "This is the wrong attitude and I would like to see Turkey as a part of Europe. This would bring Turkey, and the whole region, stability and peace."

Source http://www.hudson-ny.org/1970/tunisia-wont-use-islamist-led-turkey

Expert: Van der Sloot Free in 5 Years? 'So What?'

Joran van der Sloot's new legal strategy has people around the globe angry over the possibility that the Dutch native could be freed in less than five years in the death of a Peruvian woman. But what is being viewed as an insult to justice won't necessarily ensure his early release, an international defense expert says.

"We want Peru to accept a plea," said Michael Griffith, senior partner at the International Legal Defense Counsel. "So what if he gets a lesser sentence? That would be the best thing for everyone involved."

Griffith said that van der Sloot's willingness to make a plea might get him out of a Peruvian prison sooner than expected -- prosecutors says there is sufficient evidence to keep him jailed until 2040 -- but that there is one thing the Dutchman is not considering, and that's Natalee Holloway.

Van der Sloot is a longtime suspect in the disappearance of the Alabama teen, who was on spring break in Aruba. He is accused in the 2010 slaying of Stephany Flores. Investigators believe the Peruvian business student was killed May 30 -- exactly five years after Holloway disappeared.

On Monday, van der Sloot's attorney, Maximo Altez, said his client is willing to plead guilty to killing Flores, but will plead "violent emotion." If van der Sloot's plea is accepted, he would face three to five years in prison.

"Once he is released, he is going to be extradited on the outstanding warrant in Alabama for his alleged extortion in the Natalee Holloway case," said Griffith, whose most renowned case, involving an American incarcerated in a Turkish prison, was the basis for the film and book "Midnight Express."

Holloway's body has never been found, and van der Sloot has not been charged in her disappearance. He was, however, indicted in the U.S. on charges that he extorted $25,000 from the young woman's parents. Prosecutors said that in exchange for the money, he promised to reveal how Holloway died and the location of her body.

Van der Sloot would probably face a five- to 10-year sentence for the alleged extortion, but it is Holloway's alleged murder that could keep him behind bars for life, Griffith said.

"The key to that is that the U.S. has jurisdiction over anybody, anywhere in the world, who kills or injures a U.S. citizen," Griffith said. "It kind of originated with the Leon Klinghoffer case."

In 1985, Klinghoffer, 69, and his wife were celebrating their 36th wedding anniversary on the cruise ship Achille Lauro. Palestinian terrorists hijacked the liner, and Klinghoffer was murdered and thrown overboard. The hijackers were later given safe passage on a flight to Tunisia, but the U.S. Air Force intercepted the plane and forced it to land in Italy, where the suspects were taken into custody.

That principle, which has been used in limited cases, is being used more often today and could be applied to the Holloway case. Van der Sloot's alleged statements, along with his previous confessions in the case, are enough for U.S. authorities to make a circumstantial murder case against him, Griffith said.

However, Griffith does not believe the U.S. will be given the opportunity to extradite van der Sloot anytime soon.

"This is such a big case in Peru that I don't see them accepting a violent emotion insanity defense," he said. "It would get the populace in an uproar. Besides, how can they say he really lost it and couldn't control himself? Was he temporarily insane for only five minutes during which he allegedly attacked her?

"What he did afterward is pretty telling," Griffith added. "He is seen on video getting coffee, and he staged this whole scenario where he accidentally locked himself out. But more importantly, he goes down stairs and tells the desk clerk that his girlfriend is sleeping in his room and not to disturb her. Afterward he heads to Chile. Is this temporary insanity? No, this is a carefully thought out plan. That is what a prosecutor will argue."

Source http://www.aolnews.com/2011/03/08/joran-expert-van-der-sloot-free-in-5-years-so-what/

PROGAY begs Bahrain, free jailed gays, respect street protests

Gay activists in the Philippines have appealed Tuesday for the release of more than 120 Arab homosexuals arrested by police a week before massive protests swamped the oil-producing kingdom of Bahrain.

Goya Candelario, spokesperson of the Progressive Organization of Gays in the Philippines or PROGAY, called on the government of Bahrain to immediately free the 127 gays as their security in detention is compromised due to the political instability in the kingdom’s capital.

He said Bahraini police raided on February 2 a private reception for an alleged same-sex wedding, netting more than a hundred men, mostly visiting from Syria and Lebanon. The party venue was a sports hall in Hidd, a village on Muharraq Island.

Police argued that the party was decadent and depraved because of the presence of male guests who wore makeup and women’s attire, and were also consuming alcohol, behaviors that are sanctioned as immoral and illegal in most Gulf countries. Later, the police conducted checks to ascertain if the men engaged in sexual relations.

PROGAY expressed concern that the police in the Middle East routinely practice increased cruelty when dealing with gay men in their custody, while citing reports from returning gay overseas Filipino guest workers.

Candelario said some Filipino workers who entertain in private parties for fun or income are also being arrested in surprise raids and spend between six months to one year in prisons, where they suffer further sexual abuse, deprivation and shame.

However, victims do not file complaints and even reapply and reenter Gulf countries for work, preferring curbs on homosexual lifestyles to the grinding poverty and unemployment in the Philippines.

Last year, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia issued a blanket ban on the recruitment of known homosexuals from the Philippines, raising protests from gay activists and prospective migrant workers.

On the other hand, PROGAY also saw hope of increased freedoms for gays and lesbians in the simultaneous uprisings of the Arab peoples against tyrannical rulers in Bahrain, Egypt, Tunisia, Libya and Yemen. PROGAY believes that democratization in these countries may provide opportunities for advancing human rights based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Candelario also scored the Aquino administration for not pursuing genuine economic reforms that would generate employment for Filipinos. The gay advocate said that Aquino should now order an immediate evacuation plan to protect thousands of lives in the Middle East and Africa who fear further escalation of violence and job losses.

Progay Philippines is a service and advocacy organization that provides counseling, training and education assistance to marginalized gay, lesbian, transgender and bisexual Filipinos, especially the youth and the ageing sectors. ProGay initiated Pride traditions in the country when it led the first ever gay and lesbian Pride parade in the entire Asian region on 26 June 1994.

Source http://www.mindanaoexaminer.com/news.php?news_id=20110221213105