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CO UPDATE

Produced in cooperation with the Myrtle Solomon Memorial Trust
No 16 / December 2005

The monthly email newsletter of War Resisters' International's The Right to Refuse to Kill programme || Index of past issues

Editorial

Prisoners for Peace Day is coming up, and so this issue of CO-Update is coming out a bit earlier, to give you time to prepare for Prisoners for Peace Day. This year our special focus is on Eritrea. Please order your campaign pack, or download it from our website. And let us know what you plan for 1 December - Prisoners for Peace Day.

In addition, this issue of CO-Update e-newsletter includes information on Paraguay, on a woman CO in the USA, and on the day of action in support of Turkish conscientious objector Mehmet Tarhan.

This is our last issue for this year. We already now wish you a good Christmas (if you celebrate), and a Happy New Year.

Andreas Speck

Upcoming events

Globalising Nonviolence, 23-27 July 2006, Germany

The War Resisters' International conference Globalising Nonviolence will be a great opportunity to meet activists from all over the world, to get to know what makes them tick, and to see how you can help each make another world possible. Around the world, a movement of movements is converging. This movement seeks to counterpose the perspective and values of people's power to those of global financial institutions, transnational corporations or governments. This is a movement of globalisation from below.

WRI believes that this movement of movements has a major role to play in this globalisation from below. Hence the theme of our upcoming international conference - Globalising Nonviolence.

Conference discussions will:

More information at www.globalisingnonviolence.org

War is a Crime against Humanity:

The Story of The War Resisters' International

New book by Devi Prasad out now This book starts with a survey of the historical roots of pacifism in the presence of nonviolence within most world-religions. It goes on to describe the spread of pacifism via European non-conformist religious movements and its adoption by Tolstoi who was the first pacifist to urge action not just against the symptoms of violence but against its causes too: primary social and economic injustice. The major part of the book deals with the history of the War Resisters' International itself - including its formation and rapid spread; its response to Italian action in Abyssinia and the Spanish Civil War; the many challenges posed by World War II; the schism with Albert Einstein; compulsory military service; the Cold War and the nuclear threat; the anti-war movement in the 60s and 70s; and specific nonviolent direct actions such as those in response to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, the Bangladesh war and US draft resistance during the Vietnam war.

Devi Prasad studied at Shantiniketan, Tagore's University, worked as a teacher and artist in Sevagram, Gandhi's ashram, from the 1940s until 1962. From 1962-1972 he was General Secretary of the WRI.

During his time at the WRI significant changes took place. While still concentrating on the work for conscientious objection it widened its scope of work to nonviolence training and nonviolent action against armaments and war. One of the highlights of this development was the presentation of the Manifesto for Nonviolent Revolution at the Triennial Conference of 1972, which then was a real challenge to many people in the WRI.

Devi Prasad took a leading role in widening WRI's work towards nonviolence social change for a world without war.

Devi Prasad: War is a crime against humanity: The story of War Resisters' International

ISBN 0-903517-20-5. 560 pages, 67 photos

Publication date: 21 October 2005

Orders: £28.00 plus postage. Order online at the WRI webshop.

CO-Update

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War Resisters' International, 5 Caledonian Road, London N1 9DX, Britain; tel +44-20-7278 4040; fax +44-20-7278 0444; email co-update-editor@wri-irg.org

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1 December: Prisoners for Peace Day

Conscientious objection and desertion in Eritrea

Broken Rifle Eritrea covers

Eritrea is the focus of this years' Prisoners for Peace Day - 1 December. Eritrea is one of the few countries with an extensive conscription system for men and women. In fact, military training is an integral part of the education system, with the last school year being “served” at the military training camp. In addition, military service doesn't end – all those recruited in the last few years are still serving, unless they deserted and are presently in hiding or fled the country.

“Arbitrary detention, torture, deployment at the front line, forced labour – all without any hearing – have been common ways to punish deserters and objectors. ... Furthermore, relatives of deserters are threatened to push their children to send them to their units”, said Abraham Gebreyesus Mehreteab from the Eritrean Antimilitarism Initiative in a statement to the United Nations' Human Rights Commission in Geneva in April this year. Only a few months later, Amnesty International reported the arrest of hundreds of relatives of deserters and draft evaders. “Those arrested were the fathers, mothers or other relatives of men or women over the age of 18 who have either failed to report for national service since 1994, failed to attend the compulsory final school year at Sawa military training camp, abandoned their army unit, or left the country illegally”, wrote Amnesty International in an urgent action on 28 July 2005.

War Resisters' International is working with the Eritrean Antimilitarism Initiative and other groups to support conscientious objectors in Eritrea. As part of this work, we produced an English language version of a documentation on conscientious objection and desertion in Eritrea (available on our website), and asked Abraham Gebreyesus Mehreteab to address the United Nations' Human Rights Commission on WRI's behalf. The focus on Eritrea for this years' Prisoners for Peace Day is another step in this ongoing effort to highlight the situation in Eritrea.

We ask you to support our efforts to support Eritrean objectors and deserters. Take some time on 1 December – Prisoners for Peace Day – to write letters to prisoners (see the list in the special edition of The Broken Rifle). Ask for extra copies of the Broken Rifle for distribution among your friends, or in your local peace group. And – for us to be able to continue our work – give generously to support WRI's work in support of Eritrean objectors and deserters, and for Prisoners for Peace.

Action: 1 December - Prisoners for Peace Day

Sending cards and letters

Paraguay: More than 100,000 conscientious objectors

In October, the Human Rights Committee of the United Nations examined the periodic report of Paraguay. According to the country's report, "article 37 of the 1992 Constitution, which provides for conscientious objection in general on ethical and religious grounds in the circumstances permitted by domestic or international law. However, the only context in which specific mention is made of conscientious objection is in connection with compulsory military service in article 129, which lays down the general principles governing the procedures involved, such as the simple declaration, the exclusive or exclusionary jurisdiction of civilian bodies, exemption from punishment and establishment of obligations for those who declare themselves to be objectors."

"In view of the lack of regulatory legislation, the Human Rights Committee of the Chamber of Deputies agreed in 1994 to receive declarations from conscientious objectors and to approve their registration on a provisional basis, thereby exempting the objectors from military service until such time as the law established a public body to take responsibility for organizing

alternative service. Although there is still no regulatory legislation, the Constitution stipulates that the lack of such legislation may not be invoked to impair or deny any right or guarantee."

"By October 2002, the annual number of declared conscientious objectors stood at 15,511, bringing the cumulative total since the first conscientious objectors made their declaration in 1993 to 101,679."

The case of Paraguay is of special interest, as the country does not have a law on conscientious objection. However, the system described above is more favourable for conscientious objectors, as any law would be likely to include provisions for a substitute service, while under the present regulations there is no substitute service, and conscientious objectors are simply exempt for service.

The government's report states: "In 2003 a bill regulating conscientious objection and establishing alternative civilian service

was sent by the Chamber of Deputies to the Chamber of Senators for consideration and adoption. The Chamber of Senators rejected the bill on the ground that some articles were at variance with constitutional principles, and consideration of the possibility of introducing regulations governing the fundamental right of conscientious objection was definitively shelved."

Problematic is therefore the response of the Human Rights Committee. The Committee noted rightly that in rural areas there is a lack of information about the right to conscientious objection. However, the Committee also asks Paraguay to pass specific regulation on the right to conscientious objection, which would be likely to worsen the situation for conscientious objectors.

Sources: CONSIDERATION OF REPORTS SUBMITTED BY STATES PARTIES UNDER ARTICLE 40 OF THE COVENANT, Second periodic report: Paraguay, 9 July 2004, CCPR/C/PRY/2004/2, http://daccess-ods.un.org/access.nsf/Get?Open&DS=CCPR/C/PRY/2004/2&Lang=E

Observaciones finales del Comité de Derechos Humanos : Paraguay. 31/10/2005. CCPR/C/PRY/CO/2. (Concluding Observations/Comments), http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/(Symbol)/CCPR.C.PRY.CO.2.Sp?OpenDocument

USA: Women soldier refuses deployment to Iraq

Statement made at Ft. Benning, GA on November 17, 2005 by SPC Katherine Jashinski, first woman in the military to publicly declare resistance to participation in the war:

Katherine Jashinski"My name is Katherine Jashinski. I am a SPC in the Texas Army National Guard. I was born in Milwaukee, WI and I am 22 years old. When I graduated high school I moved to Austin, TX to attend college. At age 19 I enlisted in the Guard as a cook because I wanted to experience military life. When I enlisted I believed that killing was immoral, but also that war was an inevitable part of life and therefore, an exception to the rule.

After enlisting I began the slow transformation into adulthood. Like many teenagers who leave their home for the first time, I went through a period of growth and soul searching. I encountered many new people and ideas that broadly expanded my narrow experiences. After reading essays by Bertrand Russel and traveling to the South Pacific and talking to people from all over the world, my beliefs about humanity and its relation to war changed. I began to see a bigger picture of the world and I started to reevaluate everything that I had been taught about war as a child. I developed the belief that taking human life was wrong and war was no exception. I was then able to clarify who I am and what it is that I stand for.

The thing that I revere most in this world is life, and I will never take another person's life.

Just as others have faith in God, I have faith in humanity. I have a deeply held belief that people must solve all conflicts through peaceful diplomacy and without the use of violence. Violence only begets more violence.

Because I believe so strongly in non-violence, I cannot perform any role in the military. Any person doing any job in the Army, contributes in some way to the planning, preparation or implementation of war.

For eighteen months, while my CO status was pending, I have honored my commitment to the Army and done everything that they asked of me. However, I was ordered to Ft. Benning last Sunday to complete weapons training in preparation to deploy for war.

Now I have come to the point where I am forced to choose between my legal obligation to the Army and my deepest moral values. I want to make it clear that I will not compromise my beliefs for any reason. I have a moral obligation not only to myself but to the world as a whole, and this is more important than any contract.

I have come to my beliefs through personal, intense, reflection and study. They are everything that I am and all that I stand for. After much thought and contemplation about the effect my decision will have on my future, my family, the possibility of prison, and the inevitable scorn and ridicule that I will face, I am completely resolute. I will exercise my every legal right not pick up a weapon, and to participate in war effort. I am determined to be discharged as a CO, and while undergoing the appeals process; I will continue to follow orders that do not conflict with my conscience until my status has been resolved. I am prepared to accept the consequences of adhering to my beliefs.

What characterizes a conscientious objector is their willingness to face adversity and uphold their values at any cost. We do this not because it is easy or popular, but because we are unable to do otherwise. Thank you.

Source: http://www.indybay.org/news/2005/11/1784231.php

9 December: International action day in support of Mehmet Tarhan

Mehmet Tarhan

Several groups - including War Resisters' International - are calling for an international day of action in support of imprisoned Turkish conscientious objectors Mehmet Tarhan. Connection e.V., initiators of the day of action, writes: "the latest news from Turkey on the situation of Mehmet Tarhan (see http://www.wri-irg.org/co/turkcampaign-en.htm)  show that more international solidarity is necessary.

Besides short-term actions we like to propose a common and international action day: December 9, 2005.

With the action day we want to refer to the Human Rights Day: 10th December. To make possible protest activities in front of Turkish embassies and consulates during their office hours, we decided to choose the Friday before as action day: 9th December.

The Turkish/Kurdish War Resisters' Initiative in Germany (Kürt ve Türk Savas Karsitlari Inisiyatifi) will organize a solidarity action for the total resister and conscientious objector Mehmet Tarhan in front of the Turkish consulate general in Frankfurt/M., together with Connection e.V. and the German Peace Society - United War Resisters (DFG-VK).

We would like to encourage you to organize similar actions on the same day: For the immediate release of Mehmet Tarhan and the recognition of the human right of conscientious objection by Turkey.

Zeynettin Er, Turkish/Kurdish War Resisters' Initiative in Germany

Rudi Friedrich, Connection e.V.

Gernot Lennert, German Peace Society - United War Resisters

Recent co-alerts

In the previous month, the WRI office issued the following co-alerts:

(a full archive of co-alerts is available at wri-irg.org/news/alerts)

CO-UPDATE: the monthly email newsletter of War Resisters' International's The Right to Refuse to Kill programme || Index of past issues