A Dutch Life

Disturbing picture from Afghanistan by Stephanie Sinclair selected as UNICEF Photo of the year.

He’s forty, she’s eleven. And they are a couple – the Afghan man Mohammed F.* and the child Ghulam H.*. “We needed the money”, Ghulam’s parents said. Faiz claims he is going to send her to school. But the women of Damarda village in Afghanistan’s Ghor province know better: “Our men don’t want educated women.” They predict that Ghulam will be married within a few weeks after her engagement in 2006, so as to bear children for Faiz.

I just can’t imagine the kind of thought process that leads people consider this acceptable.

UNICEF Photo of the Year 2007s

More good news from Australia’s new Prime Minister, another fresh look at an old problem which will do wonders for our international reputation.

BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Canberra signals immigration move

Cool approach to educating people about the global menace of land mines.

On this site you can watch a Free Runner (very cool sport indeed, would have loved to do this in my younger days…) attempts to navigate around London’s Southbank without ever touching the ground.

Watch the videos:

Dangerous Ground

I’m one day late posting this, but yesterday was the 27th anniversary of the death of John Lennon. Sadly I was too young to witness his impact on the world first hand, but that hasn’t stopped me growing up admiring his approach to political expression, and indeed many of the expressions he made.

OF all the good that have died young, it is him that I wish were still here, and his view on the world today I would most appreciate.

Finally, we have signed up. This is an example of another fresh new look at an issue that has been haunting Australian politics. This leaves the US out on their own as the only country not to sign on.

There are very few things that embarrass me as an Australian, but our treatment of the Aboriginal people and our failure to sign Kyoto certainly did. Within just days of coming to power Kevin Rudd has impacted on both these issues, giving me just a little more pride.

AdelaideNow… Australia signs Kyoto Protocol

Love her or hate her Ayaan Hirsi Ali is an incredibly brave women and her freedom to speak should be protected, unconditionally.

While I’m not as familiar with her story as it relates to Dutch politics as perhaps I should be, in conversations with people here it’s clear she was as controversial nationally as she has become internationally. Regardless of your view of her politics, she is a Dutch citizen, she was a Dutch politician, and she deserves all the protection that her country can offer her, regardless of where she lives.

As an aside, it is likely that she would still be a Dutch politician, and living in Holland, if she were not driven from parliament in what appears to be a politically motivated witch-hunt.

The danger she faces is very real, certainly as real as that faced by Rushdie, to whom the British Government provided security. For anyone still in doubt, spend just a minute investigating the horrific circumstances of the death of Theo Van Gogh (yes a relative of THAT Van Gogh), who was killed because of the 10 minute film he made with Ayaan Hirsi Ali reflecting on the treatment of women in the Koran titled “Submission“.

At the very least Holland should reflect on the damage this is doing to their well deserved reputation for individual freedoms (overseas friends have discussed this with me on more than one occasion). They should also reflect on how they would feel, and what the impact on free speech would be, should anything to happen to her.

For more details on her story:

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: My life under a fatwa

To help with her security, security she now has to pay for herself:

URGENT APPEAL: Please Help Protect Ayaan Hirsi Ali

This has been such a long time coming, and I can’t tell you how happy and relieved I am about this:

‘We will say sorry’: Rudd – Federal Election 2007 News – FederalElection2007

KEVIN Rudd has vowed to act quickly after he is sworn in as prime minister to make a formal apology to Aboriginal Australians on behalf of the nation.

I’m pleased that Australia has a new Prime Minister, that we have an opportunity to take a fresh look at issues which have haunted Australian politics for more than a decade.

I remember “Walking for Reconciliation” in 2000. I remember personally approaching an Aboriginal artist performing in Adelaides mall and saying “Sorry”. I remember John Howard, tirelessly claiming that we didn’t do it, and therefore we didn’t have anything to be sorry for.

Mr Howard, you were wrong. We, as a country did do it and we should have apologised long ago, and I look forward to this now coming day with hope.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7121025.stm

…Thousands of people marched today, to put pressure on a justice system to deliver a death sentence on someone who was in their country, voluntarily, to provide a better education for their children, simply because a teddy bear was named “Muhammad” in one of her classes?

Sudan demo over jailed UK teacher

Crowds of people have marched in the Sudanese capital Khartoum to call for a tougher sentence for a UK teacher jailed for insulting religion.

I’m not entirely sure what aspect of this situation I find more disturbing. That people would march in favour of somebody being put to death? That people can become so enraged over something as insignificant as the name given to a Teddy Bear in a children’s classroom? That a UK based group could describe the 15 day sentence she was handed as a “Gravely disproportionate” punishment:

The Federation of Student Islamic Societies (Fosis), which represents more than 90,000 Muslim students in the UK and Ireland, said it was “deeply concerned” at what was a “gravely disproportionate” verdict.

Does this suggest that a punishment was actually warranted, but that jail was simply going too far? Let me help you guys, how about something like we are “Deeply concerned that this incident has been treated as a criminal matter by the Sudanese authorities”.

Of course these Sudanese Authorities are the same people supporting the Janjaweed, and who the west, and more broadly the UN, has handled with kid gloves for years, while genocide occurs in plain site.

Sometimes the world leaves me speechless.

P.S. Have been meaning to write about Australia, just this really got me going today…