CounterVortex

North Africa

Drones deployed in Libya migrant crackdown

Libyan politicians wrapped up nearly three weeks of talks in Morocco meant to set a framework for the country’s long-delayed elections. Back at home, the country’s rival sides are both cracking down hard on migrants and refugees. The Tripoli-based Government of National Unity is using armed drones to target what it says are migrant traffickers bringing people in from Tunisia. In eastern Libya, authorities have reportedly rounded up some 6,000Egyptian migrants, deporting some and holding others in a customs hangar near the border. Some suspect that this has been driven by the political calculations of Gen. Khalifa Haftar, leader of the “Libyan National Army” that controls much of the country’s east. Giorgia Meloni, Italy’s far-right prime minister, visited Haftar last month to talk migration control amid an increase in people crossing the central Mediterranean. (Photo of migrant camp near Tunisian border with Libya: UK Department for International Development via Jurist)

Watching the Shadows

UN documents torture of Gitmo detainee

The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention released a report finding that Afghanistan, Lithuania, Morocco, Poland, Romania, Thailand, United Arab Emirates and the US all participated in human rights violations against Abd al-Rahim Hussein al-Nashiri, the man accused of involvement in the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000. Al-Nashiri is currently held at Guantanamo Bay, though he is said to have been previously detained in the territories of each of these countries. The report contains graphic descriptions of “enhanced interrogation techniques” used by the US Central Intelligence Agency, including prolonged forced nudity, sleep deprivation, physical beatings, waterboarding, prolonged forced standing while chained, restrictive confinement in a small box, exposure to cold temperatures, and forced rectal feeding after prolonged food deprivation. (Photo: Pixabay via Jurist)

South Asia

Podcast: the struggle in Northeast India

In Episode 178 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg notes the new eruption of ethnic violence in Northeast India’s state of Manipur, which was the scene of far deadlier inter-communal clashes last month. The spark was the current bid by the Meitei people to become a “scheduled tribe,” granting them access to resource-rich forestlands. This is opposed by the Kuki and Naga peoples, whose tribes are already “scheduled”—but are nonetheless being targeted for eviction from Manipur’s forestlands under the guise of a crackdown on opium cultivation. The Kuki and Naga leadership perceive a land-grab for their ancestral forest territory by the Meitei—the dominant group in Manipur, who already control the best agricultural land in the state’s central Imphal Valley. The Kuki (including their Jewish sub-group, the Bnei Menashe) and Naga have long waged insurgencies seeking territorial autonomy, or even independence from India. And both their traditional territories extend across the border into Burma (where the Kuki are known as the Chin), pointing to potential convergence of the armed conflicts either side of the international line. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Photo of Naga festival: Yves Picq via Wikimedia Commons)

Syria

Seek World Court ruling on Syria torture claims

The Netherlands and Canada jointly submitted a case against Syria to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), accusing the Damascus regime of committing numerous violations of international law, including torture, since the start of the country’s civil conflict in 2011. The primary objective of the application is ICJ action compelling Syria to desist from any future use of torture. If the ICJ finds that it holds authority to rule on the matter, it will mark the first instance of an international court judging Syrian torture allegations. (Photo: ICJ)

Mexico

Protest paramilitary attacks on Zapatistas

An international mobilization was held, with small protests in cities across the world, in response to a call for support by the Zapatista rebel movement in Mexico’s southern state of Chiapas. According to the statement, the Zapatista base community of Moisés Gandhi is coming under renewed attack by the local paramilitary group ORCAO. In a May armed incursion at the community, a resident was struck by a bullet and gravely injured. Several families were displaced as ORCAO gunmen briefly occupied parts of the community. The statement charges: “Chiapas is on the verge of civil war, with paramilitaries and hired killers from various cartels fighting for the plaza [zone of territorial control]…with the active or passive complicity of the governments of [Chiapas governor] Rutilio Escandón Cadenas and [Mexican president] Andrés Manuel López Obrador.” (Photo: Chiapas Support Committee)

East Asia

UK orders closure of China-run ‘police stations’

UK Minister for Security Tom Tugendhat told Parliament that the government has ordered China to close “overseas police service stations” operating within the United Kingdom, calling the stations’ existence “unacceptable.” Tugendhat said that British authorities received reports from non-governmental organization Safeguard Defenders of such stations in Croydon, Hendon and Glasgow, with allegations of another in Belfast. The United States and Ireland both claim to have recently uncovered similar stations in their countries. Like the UK, they said the stations were used to monitor and harass Chinese diaspora communities. (Photo of Glasgow location, within restaurant storefront: Google via The Ferret)

East Asia

Hong Kong: bid to ban protest anthem backfires

The Hong Kong Department of Justice applied to the Special Administrative Region’s High Court for an injunction to prohibit any performance or online dissemination of the song “Glory to Hong Kong,” anthem of the 2019 protest movement. The government asserts that the song contains secessionist lyrics that breach multiple laws in Hong Kong and China, including the National Security Law. However, thousands of Hong Kong citizens responded to the government’s move by gathering in public to sing the song, in defiance of an ongoing ban on protests. It also shot to the top of the iTunes charts. After days of this, a judge postponed deciding on the petition, finding it potentially overbroad and asking the government to be more specific on the breadth of its request. (Image: Campaign for Hong Kong via Twtter)

Europe

EU action against Poland over ‘Russian influence’ law

The European Commission initiated infringement proceedings against Poland over the country’s recently-passed law aimed at officials who have allegedly come under Russian influence. The Commission says that the law “interferes with the democratic process” by potentially subjecting officials running for re-election to high-profile inquiries, effectively barring candidates from public office. The ruling right-wing Law & Justice Party (PiS) is ironically accused by the opposition of emulating Russia in seeking to impose an authoritarian regime through the subterfuge of a “Russian influence” law. Crowds at a massive Warsaw protest against the law waved the EU flag, making clear their antipathy to Russian designs on the continent. (Photo: Germany Today News)

Europe

France: far-right party Kremlin links exposed

A French parliamentary report leaked to the press asserts that Marine Le Pen’s far-right party Rassemblement National knowingly served as a “communication channel” for Kremlin propaganda. Le Pen called the report “sectarian, dishonest and politicized”—despite the fact that it was Le Pen herself who demanded an investigation into foreign interference in French politics. Le Pen has long been openly supportive of the Kremlin. After Russia invaded Crimea in 2014, Le Pen insisted that Moscow’s annexation of the territory was not illegal. Her party, previously named the National Front, is known for extreme anti-immigrant, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic and anti-EU stances. As such, French banks are hesitant to give the party loans for campaigns. Le Pen instead obtained loans from a Russian bank in 2014, and more recently from Hungary’s state bank in 2022. (Photo: gregroose/Pixabay via Jurist)

Europe

Kakhovka: ‘ecocide’ as war crime in Ukraine

In Episode 177 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg examines the unfolding Kakhovka dam disaster in Ukraine, an evident design by Russia to forestall a Ukrainian counter-offensive into the occupied southeast of the country. Massive flooding has been unleashed downstream, imperiling some of the world’s most important farmland. Upstream, coolant water to the Zaporizhzhia power plant is threatened, escalating Russia’s “reckless nuclear gamble” at the facility. It is true that the disaster gravely impacts much Russian-held territory, including the Crimea Peninsula. However, despite Moscow’s official denials of responsibility, Russia’s online internal propaganda organs are bragging about it. The Wagner Group mercenary outfit calls the disaster “beautiful” and boasts that the destruction of dams on the Dnipro River is a “trump card” against Ukraine. The cataclysm on the Dnipro provides a grim test case as the International Criminal Court moves to adopt “ecocide” as a recognized international crime. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Map: PCL)

East Asia

Macau national security law threatens free speech

Reporters Without Borders denounced Macau’s expansion of its national security law, saying the revision “increases the pressure on journalists and further threatens…residents’ right to information.” The Macau Special Administrative Region’s National Security Law, first passed in 2009, defines seven crimes that can result in a maximum sentence of up to 25 years’ imprisonment. Under the revised rules, these crimes have been expanded far beyond their previous definitions. For example, “subversion” and “secession” now extend to non-violent acts, while “sedition” includes “acts that incite participation in riots.” Additionally, the law now applies to “any individual” who is suspected of undermining China’s national security. This applies regardless of the territory in which the acts occur, and regardless of the individual’s nationality—meaning that Macau law enforcement will have authority to pursue suspected violations extraterritorially. (Photo: kewl.lu via Wikimedia Commons)

The Amazon

Brazil: anti-indigenous laws advance in congress

The Brazilian Congress has approved two measures that undermine indigenous land rights and clash with the environmental policy of the new President Luiz Inácio da Silva. First, the Lower House voted in favor of a bill that limits the demarcation of indigenous territories to lands that native peoples can prove they physically occupied when Brazil’s current constitution was enacted in 1988. Advocates for indigenous peoples say this marco temporal or “time limit trick” could wipe out scores of legitimate land claims by groups who had already been evicted from their traditional territories before 1988. Then, both houses approved a bill that transfers responsibility for demarcation from the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples to the Ministry of Justice & Public Security. The changes still need the approval of President “Lula” da Silva—although he may face a veto override by Congress. (Photo via Mongabay)