This is one of those things you’re almost ashamed to report because the cynicism & corruption involved are as low as it goes. Yesterday, the National League for Democracy (NLD), the party of Aung San Suu Kyi which fronts for the military junta, held an interfaith prayer rally in a Yangon soccer stadium to pray for peace & religious harmony in Burma. Twenty-thousand Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, all sitting apart, lit candles & held up photos of Suu Kyi while they were addressed by religious leaders from each religion in a city which is over 90-percent Buddhist. All this whilst the Burmese army continues to torch entire villages, starve out Rohingya villagers, & hunt down those fleeing like they were animals. It is estimated that 5,000 Rohingya flee for their lives every day.

There are photos from the prayer rally of Christian nuns, Hindus, politicians, supporters of the NLD. There is also this photo of Cardinal Charles Bo, the Catholic Archbishop of Yangon, attending the rally. Were they there willingly? Were they coerced or rewarded in some way for attending? How can Pope Francis who protested (though not loudly enough) the genocide of the Rohingya allow his representative & one of the highest officials of the Catholic Church to be a party to whitewashing genocide? Unfortunately, it is not unlike the conduct of Cardinal Mario Zenari, the papal envoy to Syria, who collaborates with the Assad regime. The Catholic Church cannot play both sides of the street in a genocide anymore than it can in a revolution against dictatorship.

If Cardinal Bo feared for his life if he did not attend with an entourage of nuns & priests, then the moral, principled, decent thing to do was to take an airplane to the Vatican & denounce the genocide from the papal balcony in St. Peter’s Square. He can’t pull that schtick that Suu Kyi did for so long that speaking out against the genocide was too risky. If you don’t speak out against it, you are directly in collusion with it. Or what’s the point of being a religious leader?

(Photo of Cardinal Bo attending prayer rally by Thein Zaw/AP)

An excellent presentation by documentary filmmaker Shafiur Rahman on the masked black-dressed death squads attacking Hindus in Arakan state:

https://www.thequint.com/news/world/who-is-the-black-squad-and-why-are-they-killing-rohingya-hindus-in-myanmar

Final part of five-part series by Raqib Hameed Naik where Rohingya refugees in India talk about who they are & what they want:

http://twocircles.net/2017oct11/417548.html

So much of Vijay Prashad’s writings, especially on the issue of Syria, sound like US State Department analyses. It’s a very identifiable approach taught in international studies departments around the world that focuses on power politics to the neglect of popular social movements. This approach has misled Prashad so badly in Syria that he’s disgraced himself by supporting Russian & Syrian bombing of civilian populations so Assad can take out Al-Qaeda even though he correctly opposes US intervention.

Now In These Times has published a discussion between Phyllis Bennis, Ali Issa, & Prashad on the future of the antiwar movement titled “The US Is Bombing at Least Six Countries. How Can the Anti-War Movement Step Up?” This is the central question in international politics today & a thoroughgoing analysis is long overdue. Unfortunately, none of these elaborates the causes for the decline in the movement nor the way out of its present malaise so much as they reflect the problems, which are not specific to the US. The sectarianism, provincialism, inability & even unwillingness to organize the grassroots which characterize the US movement is an international problem. The primary problem is the left’s support for the Assad dictatorship, for Russian & Syrian bombing of civilians, & the denial of the popular revolution against Assad. This has led forces within the US movement to proclaim they don’t oppose Russian & other foreign intervention in Syria because only US intervention should concern US activists. Separating US intervention from the other counter-revolutionary forces & claiming the US is on a regime-change mission is how they justify supporting counter-revolution in Syria.

In his contribution, Prashad laid out a litany of six “core issues” that “there ought to be agreement on” among the left which could rejuvenate the antiwar movement. Pardon me for pointing out the obvious, but a broad-based social movement does not have a body of doctrine to which all must subscribe. One of his proposed six demands was “reduction of the military budget.” Call me unreasonable, but I don’t agree with his call for a reduction in the military budget. My proposal is for its complete elimination, including dismantling all US bases, the Pentagon, & the CIA. But I don’t require anyone to agree with me & would be proud to march against war with those who agree with Prashad. There cannot be any political conditions laid down for participation in the antiwar movement except opposition to wars by whichever governments are involved.

Leftists should not control the politics of the antiwar movement. In the past, thousands of activists from liberals to socialists have come together to democratically hammer out the program & methods of the movement & to build a movement where all opposed to war, for whatever reasons, may participate. That’s what is needed now. That is not lowest common denominator politics. All those whose families & lives are affected by wars should have a say in how to build the largest movements to oppose them.

Photo montage is 2003 protests against Iraq War which took place in 60 countries with estimates up to 30 million people participating.

(Photo montage from The Atlantic)

Part Four of five-part series by Raqib Hameed Naik interviewing Rohingya refugees in India about who they are & what they want:

http://twocircles.net/2017oct10/417527.html

Audrey Gaughran, Amnesty International’s Director of Global Issues, issued this statement:

“While it is positive that Myanmar & Bangladesh are discussing options for the safe return of Rohingya to their homes, this must be a voluntary process & not lead to a hasty & reckless effort to push people back against their will. No one should be forced back to a situation where they will continue to face serious human rights violations & systemic discrimination & segregation.”

No offense to the diplomatic efforts of Amnesty, but it is not positive. It is a snow job & no concessions should be made to it. There can be no repatriation schemes worked out between Burma & Bangladesh. There can be no decisions about the fate of Rohingya refugees without their direct & democratic involvement. The issue now is not repatriation. Not until the Burmese army has been forced to withdraw lock, stock, & barrel from Arakan state; not until the generals & Suu Kyi have been prosecuted for crimes against humanity; not until the Buddhist death squads have been apprehended & prosecuted. Not until the Rohingya people are able to ensure their safety & full human, democratic, & civil rights.

The issue now is not repatriation but refugee rights first in Bangladesh where refugees are still starving & being treated like livestock. Rohingya are stateless & have no papers to get asylum in other countries. That is a priority for Amnesty: demanding governments provide asylum with full rights including residency & work papers, housing, access to education, healthcare, social services, & safe passage to get there. This is not the time for pipe dreams but for defense of refugees, many of whom are imprisoned, under threat of deportation, or targets for human traffickers.

(Photo of refugee camp in Bangladesh by Paula Bronstein/Getty Images)

Last Saturday, Naripokkho, a Bangladeshi women’s rights group, & Durbar Network, a human rights group, held a joint protest in Dhaka titled “Solidarity with the Persecuted Rohingya People” demanding an end to genocide against the Rohingya people & demanding the Bangladeshi government ensure the safety of Rohingya women & children, including counseling & 24-hour healthcare facilities in the camps.

International women’s & human rights groups must join them in demanding special protections & programs for women & children refugees, especially those children orphaned & without guardians. The Rohingya genocide is a women’s rights & child welfare issue of the first magnitude.

(Photo of protest from Dhaka Tribune)

From the most unexpected places we find truth–not in the existential sense but as opposed to fake news. Bangladesh Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali was discussing Burma’s proposal for repatriating some refugees. The proposal is nothing but a stunt for those willing to be fooled–or as Ali put it, a way for Burma to “neutralize” opposition from other governments. Of course, Ali doesn’t say is that there is no opposition from other governments that is more than ceremonial. In a genocide, words don’t count. Action is required & that has not been forthcoming from any government. Where is Erdogan now that the grandstanding moment is over? Most importantly, the Rohingya fled genocide & would not willingly go back to be finished off by death squads. You’d have to be as moronic as Trump not to recognize that.

Bangladesh can keep trying to prevent refugees from entering the country & can make life hell on earth when they arrive, but in his comments Ali acknowledges that they cannot work with Burma to force refugees at gunpoint to return to certain death without facing political consequences–given the hundreds of thousands of protesters around the world in support of the Rohingya, .

Now here’s that moment of truth: the Burmese generals & Suu Kyi maintain that the genocidal offensive against the Rohingya was ignited when ARSA attacked police stations & an army base on August 25th. At one point, Bangladesh offered to deploy troops to help Burma beat back the ARSA terrorists. But in this strategy meeting, minister Ali said the Burmese army was strengthening its forces in Arakan state a month before August 25th. Which is exactly what Rohingya analysts & Burmese dissident Maung Zarni reported. This was a planned genocide & the alleged actions of ARSA had nothing to do with it.

Minister Ali also said that the Burmese army worked with Buddhist nationalists to execute the genocide. Again, exactly what Rohingya analysts & Maung Zarni reported: that the Burmese army was arming & training civilian death squads & working in concert with them to torch villages & commit atrocities against Rohingya & Hindu civilians. Ali went on to say that the Burmese junta & Suu Kyi were spreading fake news by trying to make the issue “Islamic terrorism” or “extremist Bengali terrorism” rather than admit genocide. Our man Ali did not go on to explain why Bangladesh offered troops to fight Rohingya terrorism when they knew it was just propaganda to justify genocide.

These little Rohingya kids, many of them orphaned by genocide, are the ones Minister Ali has to face when he explains the treacheries of the Bangladeshi government.

(Photo of kids at refugee camp in Bangladesh)