Double standards: Kony vs the Terminator

I’m shaking my head in disbelief. After submitting an article on Joseph Kony for publication, I thought I’d developed quite a thorough insight into the position of major international organisations and world powers towards warlords accused of horrific atrocities. Then, earlier tonight, I turned my attention to Channel 4 News and felt like a damn fool. Who on earth, I ask myself, is Bosco Ntaganda, aka “The Terminator”? And why haven’t I even picked up on this notorious rogue leader until now? I blame myself for remaining ignorant; I could take the easy way out and blame “the media”, but I know that I could, and should, have done more to find out before now.

Bosco Ntaganda was indicted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes in 2006, though his arrest warrant was only made public in April 2008.  The parallels between Ntaganda and Joseph Kony are uncanny: child soldiers were abducted to fill his ranks; civilians massacred, raped, and mutilated – all under his orders as chief of military operations for a militia group during internal conflict in the north-east Democratic Republic of Congo. Yet, in sharp contrast to Kony, he’s been hiding in plain sight ever since.

Ntaganda stands accused of “the enlistment, conscription and active use of children in 2002-3” in the northeastern district of Ituri, when he headed the military operations of an ethnic Hema militia group, the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC). Note – he was a close associate of Thomas Lubunga, a fellow Congolese rebel leader who became the first recipient of a verdict from the ICC; he was found guilty of conscripting child soldiers into the UPC) in 2009 and is yet to be sentenced.

After leaving the UPC in 2006, Ntaganda assumed his current position as military chief of staff of the National Congress for the Defense of the People (CNDP) in the Congo, led by Laurent Nkunda. According to Human Rights Watch:

The CNDP is considered responsible for serious abuses against civilians in the North Kivu province of eastern Congo. But on January 23, 2008, the Congolese government signed a peace agreement in Goma, North Kivu, with 22 armed groups, including the CNDP. Under its terms all parties agreed to an immediate ceasefire and committed to respecting international human rights law… 

… Ntaganda is the fourth Congolese rebel leader sought by the ICC for war crimes. Three other Congolese defendants – Thomas Lubanga, Germain Katanga, and Mathieu Ngudjolo – are already in ICC custody.

Special envoys from the African Union, the European Union, the United States, the United Nations, and the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region played a vital role in brokering the Goma peace agreement. A number of these diplomats meet regularly with CNDP representatives as part of the peace process. Human Rights Watch urged them to use their influence to pressure CNDP officials to swiftly hand over Ntaganda to the ICC.

Unfortunately, efforts to arrest Ntaganda and put him on trial in the Hague have failed to bear fruit. As Channel 4’s Jonathon Miller explains:

…since the arrest of Lubanga in 2005, forces under the command of Bosco Ntaganda are accused of mass killings during a rebellion three years ago – according to a United Nations report.Yet today, General Bosco lives openly in the eastern city of Goma where he is in charge of 50,000 Congolese soldiers. The 17,000 UN peacekeepers stationed in the country are powerless to apprehend him. Their spokesman told us they cannot arrest him without an order from the president. As a signatory of the ICC, Congo is legally obliged to arrest a suspect indicted by the court.

But President Kabila has not done so… Witnesses and victims who have spoken to Channel 4 News accuse General Bosco of continuing to rape, torture, murder and recruit child soldiers – a reign of terror which, they say, carries on to this day. The ICC is aware of these allegations…

Under a peace deal which ended the 2008 rebellion, Bosco Ntaganda’s forces were reintegrated into the Congolese national army. He was promoted to the rank of general in January 2009 and was, say well-placed sources, instrumental is getting President Joseph Kabila re-elected at the end of last year, by securing votes in the east.

“Bosco Ntaganda is a man at the peak of his power at the moment,” said Anneke van Woudenberg of Human Rights Watch. 

“He drives around Goma without a care in the world. He goes to the top restaurants. He plays tennis. He shows up at his office. He wines, he dines. This is a man who doesn’t think anyone is ever going to lift a finger to arrest him.”

Unbelievable. Perhaps I’m just incredibly naive, but it frustrates me beyond belief that this is the way the world works. The whole affair gives a very dark sheen to the concepts of bureaucracy and diplomacy, and casts a dark shadow on the whiter-than-white image of Western citizens promoted in the Kony 2012 campaign. This all feels, to me, like a long-overdue wake-up call.

Sri Lanka

After meaning to watch it for almost 9 months, I’ve finally watched Channel 4’s shocking investigative documentary: Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields.

I’ll be honest: my understanding of the conflict in Sri Lanka – and of the country as a whole, for that matter – was very limited beforehand. So I won’t pretend to be an expert after watching one documentary and doing a little speed-reading.

Watching it did, however, bring me to ask some very uncomfortable questions. How has the international community let this one slide? How did it allow tens of thousands of civilians to be caught up in a conflict not their own in the first place? How, and why? Why, why, why?

I’m not a cynic by nature. In fact, I’ve recognised for a while now that in many ways, I’m really quite naive about the world. I grew up with a vague idea that at the end of the day, there were enough good people in power to counterbalance all the bad ones, and make sure things turned out all right in the end. But gradually, I grew up. And I continue to grow up. And that process has involved recognising that most things in life come in shades of grey.

Simplicity is golden. It is a luxury, it can be elusive. Simplicity can be misleading. Crude simplifications of complex situations can justify extreme behaviour, if one side represents right, and the other, wrong. Simplicity breeds ignorance: a polarised view of the world.

Yet without simplification – a clear idea of right, wrong, good, bad – everything blurs and runs. Order becomes chaos, courage and conviction dissolve, morals seem pointless, and people lose hope. Alliances are formed and battles fought around the simple principle of good versus bad, despite the fact that there is always a history to any battle of alliance which tells a much hazier, more convoluted, story.

Now, all this is nothing new. But it’s a trail of philosophical thought that taps into everything we think, and everything we do. It’s easy to simplify, and it’s awkward to empathise. It’s harder still to draw the line between simplifying and oversimplifying, to know when to pass definitive judgement and when to empathise. I have always kept my convictions quite fluid, purely because the more that I learn, the more slippery those convictions become in my hands. History teaches so many sides to so many stories. Yet we also see simple cycles repeating themselves over and over.

The idea of simplicity is a fascinating paradox. We base our lives (and our religions) around simple principles, without which we’d be lost. That’s one of the reasons atheism is scary: it centres around the idea that there is a vast unknown that cannot and may never be explained. That there’s no point to life, beyond the little goals and milestones we set up in our own universes. But this is also quite liberating, isn’t it? That there are no real limits, and that we were all just lucky enough to evolve and survive? It’s scary, and brilliant. Just like life is simple, but complicated. Full of paradoxes.

…Anyway, that’s quite enough from me.

Bad omens for Egypt

The unrest in Cairo is making me uneasy. First and foremost, a very close friend of mine, who also happens to be a budding journalist, has just jetted off there, and I have visions of him doing vox pops amid a mob of angry protestors wielding flaming torches through the streets. Secondly, there is the obvious observation that violence now could put a thorn in the side of social and political progress in Egypt. I really, really want the Arab Spring to have positive consequences for all countries who took/continue to take part in it – but is this too naive? Can it ever really be as simple as overthrowing one leader to enjoy a new, utopian society?

These things go through cycles. Throughout history, people have obeyed and rebelled, then obeyed, then rebelled. All over the world, we have sworn loyalty to a new way, a new regime, only to see it darken over time, and then we tear it down with a vengeance. This principle stretches from the downfall of New Labour to full-blown civil war, to regicide against Charles I, and so on and so forth. It’s sad, but it’s true – and I don’t think it’s going to change anytime soon.

The situation in Egypt is following a common pattern. A leader is overthrown; a nation celebrates, unified by the victory. Then comes the vying for power between the religious, military and political/civil ranks; in Egypt, we have the military, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the revolutionaries. I think it’s too soon to say whether the political dominance of the Muslim Brotherhood is a good or bad thing. For a Brit such as myself to judge one way or another would be to impose our model of a secular society onto a country with entirely different cultural roots, which is not a good idea.

But with conflict infesting itself across the capital, it seems to me that the situation is going to get worse before it gets better; people are disappointed that one year on from those jubilant celebrations life has not really improved, and I don’t see those people becoming any less angry anytime soon. I could be wrong – this could be a blip in the road to recovery. I hope I’m wrong. And I hope my friend will stay safe and unadventurous until things die down a little.

India’s Silent War

Fascinating insight into a conflict that is never reported in Britain, as far as I’m aware: India’s Silent War.

Gaddafi gone: what next for Libya?

Here’s a very interesting video and some other interesting links regarding the legacy of Muammar Gaddafi, shot dead this afternoon by NTC forces.

There are also some interesting links elaborating on his political career, spanning over 40 years. I’ve only just seen this BBC biography, first posted in August – I’m surprised by just how unashamedly damning an account it is. Though perhaps it’s inevitable given Britain’s commitment to fighting against him; a skeptical mind would question the extent to which the BBC’s coverage here is designed to support government interests.

As I have previously mentioned in earlier posts, I remain apprehensive about the future of Libya. So many different groups and factions feel they have earnt a stake in Libya’s future governance; how easy will it be to appease such diverse and often conflicting interests?

What do you think? Does Gaddafi’s death represent the dawn of a wonderful new era for Libya? Please leave your responses below – all feedback appreciated.

Charlie Brooker’s ‘How To’ Guide

One of many brilliant clips from Charlie Brooker. Enjoy.

The darkening Arab Spring

Today’s BBC headlines on the protests in Tunis turning nasty, as conservative Islamists fight to be heard prior to the elections for a constituent assembly next week, indicate a worrying potential parallel between the futures of Libya, Tunisia and Egypt. The prospect of a peaceful, unified future seems increasingly under threat across all three countries, as sectarian divisions and tensions with security forces grow stronger.

Syria, meanwhile, remains trapped in the throes of brutal government repression of the revolution, with new figures pronouncing the protest death toll at 3,000. The suggestion that Syria is heading towards full-scale civil war has already been made. What is more concerning in the long term is the fact that the Syrian National Council – Syria’s version of Libya’s National Transitional Council – includes within its many component groups a banned Islamic political party: the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. The inclusion of an Islamist group in Syria’s post-revolution government could be very divisive and could jeopardise Syria’s external relationship with Europe and its internal peace. Also included within this fractured coalition is a bundle of Kurdish factions and tribal leaders; the parallels with Libya are clear, and the threat of total disunity in post-revolution Syria (assuming that the revolution does actually succeed, and President Bashar al-Assad is removed from power) is potentially very dangerous.

The Arab Spring has certainly turned ugly. Hopes of a brighter post-revolutionary future seem to be fading fast – but what do you think? Do you remain optimistic for the long-term consequences of the uprisings? Please leave your comments below.

P.S. Here’s an interesting, short video on the economic impact of the Arab Spring. It offers food for thought in terms of the outlook for Libya and Syria in particular.

What next for Libya?

So the Guardian are leading today with ‘Only 100 Loyalists left fighting as Libya war reaches its endgame’. But what happens next?

We all remember the elation of Egyptian civilians at the success of the revolution. Yet within months sectarian violence has shattered any image of a post-revolution utopia. Worse still is the fractured nature of the conflict. Not only is the Muslim majority clashing with the Coptic Christian minority, but Coptic Christians are blaming the security forces for provoking the bloody violence at last Sunday’s Coptic Christian protest against a Muslim attack on a Christian church, which led to 25 fatalities. Worryingly, then, sectarian divisions have already spilled over into ‘the worst violence since Mubarak was ousted’, which in turn has impacted badly upon relations between security forces and civilians. All this, of course, could well lead to further, dangerous escalation of conflict.

And so to Libya. The role of Islam in post-Gaddafi Libya remains uncertain, and tensions between secularists and Islamists are already surfacing within the NTC. On Monday, Libyan Muslim cleric Sheik Ali Al-Salabi called for moderate Islam to play a role in the governance of Libya. Yet his message was not met with whole-hearted support; some argued that Islam should have no role in politics. Katerina Nikolas, writing for the citizen journalism-sponsoring Digital Journal aptly summarises the dilemma:

The future political face of Libya will be determined by either secularism of Islamism. The NTC has said the new Libya will be based on sharia law. However Salabi’s calls for a moderate Islam may simply be a token gesture as leaders including Belhadj have long wanted a caliphate state. One of the two main aims of the LIFG have been achieved through civil war, the overthrow of Gaddafi. Their second aim of turning Libya into an Islamic caliphate may become the next reality, despite Salabi’s moderate words.

Click here to read the full article.

The trouble does not end with religion, however. Long-standing regional and tribal differences may endure in a post-Gaddafi Libya, and could threaten to exacerbate any outbreak of conflict between secularists and Islamists. Thomas Basille of Fox News argues (though not altogether convincingly) that Libya’s future hinges upon the provision of essential public services and facilities – clean water, electricity, food, security, etc – since, he claims ‘people want and need the same things’, whether in the US, Iraq, or Libya. Although this is perhaps a crude simplification of the distinct differences between the social, religious and political environment in the US, Iraq and Libya respectively, his point still stands: the National Transitional Council simply cannot afford to allow any ideological or religious differences to take priority in the earliest stages of post-Gaddafi Libya, since this will endanger the lives and livelihoods of all those who fought for the country’s revolution.

Whether or not Libya can dust itself off and march onwards to a united and peaceful future remains to be seen. It even remains unclear how the spoils of war will be shared between the NATO countries that have intervened in Libya, and what form the future relationship between Libya, Europe and the US will take. I just hope the Arab Spring does not darken as the winter draws in.

Will you pass the test?

Very interesting challenge: to pass the current UK Citizenship test! Can you prove your right to live in the UK? Leave comments below/on twitter/facebook with your results!