Daily Archives: June 26, 2017

WASHINGTON, D.C. U.S. Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) led a bipartisan group of Senators in sending a letter to President Donald Trump, June 23, ahead of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modis visit to Washington D.C. The letter implores President Trump to use his meeting with the prime minister as an opportunity to discuss Indias discriminatory policies against foreign religious and humanitarian organizations.

Sens. Blunt, Crapo, Lankford, and Klobuchar signed on to Sen. Kennedys letter encouraging the president to make it clear to Prime Minister Modi that human rights and religious liberty remain a top priority.

Over the past few years, the Indian government has made it difficult if not impossible for religious and humanitarian organizations to get funding to their charitable operations in India. Many of these organizations are simply trying to meet the basic needs of the citizens of India. Compassion International even had to leave India. This humanitarian aid organization had helped feed and provide health care to children in India for nearly 50 years. Now thousands of innocent children will be left without this critical support, said Sen. Kennedy. Discriminating against foreign organizations that help the citizens of India is counterproductive, and it needs to change. I ask that President Trump address this serious issue with Prime Minister Modi during his upcoming trip to Washington.

Below is the text of the letter.

_____________________________

June 23, 2017

The Honorable Donald J. Trump

President of the United States

The White House

Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President:

Thank you for your commitment to protecting and advancing religious liberty around the world. You have made it clear that protecting religious freedom deserves our constant vigilance. We agree that our support for democracy requires persistent efforts to support and advocate for religious liberty around the world.

We are particularly concerned about violations of religious liberty in India. India is the worlds largest democracy and therefore holds a position of importance on the world stage, making the ongoing violations even more disturbing. Despite Indias size and religious diversity, violations of religious liberty have existed for years.

Every year, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) releases a report outlining the state of religious freedom across the world. India has consistently remained a Tier 2 country, meaning that USCIRF believes it requires close monitoring based on evidence of violations of religious freedom. These include violence, discrimination, and forced conversions, as well as harassment and intimidation.

Of significant concern is Indias recent use of its Foreign Contributions Regulations Act (FCRA) to target humanitarian and religious organizations. Any foreign religious organizations, including missionaries, working in India must comply with this law. In 2011, the Indian Parliament amended FCRA to allow the government to block funds for foreign organizations that conduct any activities detrimental to the national interest.

The Indian government has since used this broad provision to target foreign humanitarian and religious organizations that serve the Indian people, such as Compassion International that was forced to leave India and the 145,000 Indian children it served. Other organizations that have come under scrutiny include the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Ford Foundation, Amnesty International, and Greenpeace. Other evangelical Christian organizations, such as the Southern Baptist Convention, have also faced discrimination of various kinds. The number of organizations that have lost their licenses has exceeded 10,000 since Prime Minister Modi took office.

Based on these troubling developments, we ask that you make religious liberty a top priority when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visits the United States this month. We request that you use the United States strong, longstanding relationship with India to encourage Prime Minister Modi to alleviate the discrimination against these organizations, particularly religious-based aid groups, and to take steps to advance religious liberty for all of Indias citizens.

The United States has served as an example of religious liberty for the entire world ever since its founding. These principles underlie the essence of what it means to be American. Even more importantly, the freedom to practice ones own religious beliefs underlies the essence of what it means to be human and live in a democracy. We encourage you to bring these violations to Prime Minister Modis attention and continue to work to protect religious liberty across the globe.

Sincerely,

John Kennedy

United States Senator

Roy Blunt

United States Senator

Mike Crapo

United States Senator

James Lankford

United States Senator

Amy Klobuchar

United States Senator

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Louisiana's John Kennedy leads US Senate effort against oppression in India - The Baptist Message

NEW DELHI: Have you heard of the Gadia lohars who fought in the army of Maharana Pratap and several other Rajput rulers against the Mughals or the Maravars of Tamil Nadu who protected the kingdoms of the chola emperors and resisted the British for many years?

Notified as criminal tribes by the British in the nineteenth century largely as a price for their resistance to oppression and then denotifed by the Indian government but never really classified or given their due, the Modi government has decided to assess and improve the living conditions of 10 crore people belonging to nomadic and denotified tribes of the country whose contribution to the freedom struggle has never been popularised.

Last week, the National Commission for Denotified, Nomadic and Seminomadic Tribes (NCDNT) that comes under the ministry of Social Justice presented an interim report to the centre charting out a roadmap to improve the lives of these communities, bring out their long forgotten history and make them an important part of the electorate by ensuring government schemes such as Mudra and Jan Dhan Yojna reached them.

An exhaustive household survey for the first time has been launched across the county to study the living conditions of these tribes and document their histories. Secretary of the commission B K Prasad said the history of denotified and nomadic tribes was one of suppression and exploitation that they have faced persecution for more than 150 years. This report and the steps we take based on our interactions is an attempt to reverse this injustice.

Agencies Karvy in the nothern zone, Vimarsh in the western zone, Academy of Management Studies, Life Academy of Vocational Studies in the Eastern zone, Karvy in the North Eastern zone and Vimarsh in the southern zone have been picked to conduct this survey.

These agencies starting June 1 are compiling data about each of these communities, taking a sample size of 9000. They will assess the socio economic conditions and submit a report to us in six months, Prasad added. He added that the commission is now working on a deadline and findings of the survey - first in independent India will help it further in its intervention.

The researchers have studied the history and living conditions of over 200 such communities. For instance, the gadia lohar community found in five north states were blacksmiths in the army of Maharana Pratap. They live under self-imposed taboos not to return to Chittorgarh fort, not to use ropes to draw water or use candles at home as a protest for freedom. Today, due to mechanisation, they work as labourers or sell iron scraps, said Siddharth M, researcher, who added that stories collected from all these communities are being documented.

Similar the maravars, glorifed in the ancient text Thirukkurral, were protectors of Tamil emperors and worked as as Kudikaval (traditional policing communities). But they resisted the British who suppressed them. During our interactions they told us the story of Rani Velu Nachiyar who fought the british but was never given the same importance as Rani Laxmibai. Today the community members work in matchbox factories with bare minimum facilities, the report said.

Experts said the colonial category of criminal tribes may have been denotified but many communities remain unclassified. The Ayyangar Committees recommendations led to the repeal of the CTA in August 1952. In 2008, the National Commission for Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes (NCDNT) produced a report where it said, But, to keep effective control over the so-called hardened criminals, the Habitual Offenders Act was placed in the statute book.

To address that, besides listing of ways to make schooling and medical care accessible to these nomadic groups and recommending grazing rights in forests, specific training, scholarship and housing benefits, the commission has sought for a review of the Habitual Offenders Act 1952 which has come provisions from the erstwhile Criminal Tribes Act that add to the harassment faced by these communities.

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Government tries to right the wrongs against persecuted tribes - Economic Times

BBC News

UKIP should not become anti-Islam, party's Welsh MEP warns BBC News Mr Gill told BBC Wales, government should not dictate what "you can and can't wear" and said he did not want to associate himself with the campaign. UKIP said the veil was an "instrument of oppression", adding it sought to "lift the veil" on "that ... and more »

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UKIP should not become anti-Islam, party's Welsh MEP warns - BBC News

NewsBusters (press release) (blog)

Nets Ignore India's Recent Spike in Christian Persecution NewsBusters (press release) (blog) According to Open Doors President David Curry, the Indian government is actually supportive of Christian oppression. Also, it has become increasingly hostile to American NGOs, including Christian ministry Compassion International, which was forced to ... and more »

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Nets Ignore India's Recent Spike in Christian Persecution - NewsBusters (press release) (blog)

On 11 June Avigdor Lieberman proudly announced that Israel was planning its greatest expansion of settlement homes since 1992. Ramot in the occupied West Bank. Photograph: Ronen Zvulun/Reuters

Two weeks ago I found myself in a sweaty room in the Royal Courts of Justice, packed with fellow Palestine activists, listening to detailed and sometimes arcane legal arguments about pension law. The journey that ended in that courtroom began in September last year when the government announced new guidance intended to prohibit local government pension schemes from pursuing divestment and sanctions against foreign nations and UK defence industries other than where formal legal sanctions, embargoes and restrictions have been put in place by the government.

The key target of these new rules was made clear in the government press release about the decision. This was the government acting to place a ban on boycotting Israel. The regulations were introduced in November 2016 despite a public consultation indicating that 98% of respondents thought this was the wrong thing to do, and a wider public outcry.

The Palestine Solidarity Campaign, of which Im the director, decided to take the government on. We launched a judicial review supported with witness statements from War on Want, Campaign Against the Arms Trade and the Quakers. Finally, on 22 June, we got the verdict we won! Judge Sir Ross Cranston ruled the guidance was unlawful and that the government had acted for an improper purpose.

This is a victory for the rule of law, for local democracy and for freedom of expression. But it is also a crucial moment in the campaign for Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel until it complies with international law. This campaign emerged in 2005 in answer to a call from 170 Palestinian civil society organisations, frustrated by the decades in which international governments and bodies had issued condemnations of Israels oppression of the Palestinian people but refused to impose meaningful pressure.

The consequences of this failed policy were underlined in the last month, during which Israels illegal occupation of East Jerusalem, the West bank and Gaza entered its 50th year. On 11 June the countrys foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, proudly announced that Israel was planning its greatest expansion of settlement homes since 1992, one year before the Oslo accords launched the so-called peace process. During that time the number of illegal settlers occupying the West Bank and East Jerusalem has grown by nearly half a million. On 20 June ,as work started on the first illegal settlement to be built outside the existing settlement blocks in 25 years, Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted After decades, I have the privilege to be the prime minister who is building a new community in Judea and Samaria. Or to put it in clearer language , here is a prime minster who feels privileged to be violating international law.

The BDS movement is a response to Israels confidence that it can act with impunity. Modelled on the same tactics used so successfully against apartheid South Africa, it calls on all actors to end economic support for Israels illegal actions.

The UK governments attempts to force though the pension regulations were part and parcel of a wider attempt by Israel and its supporters to push back against the growing success of the BDS campaign. In April a leaked joint report from the Israeli thinktank the Reut Institute and the US Anti-Defamation League boasted of the success since 2010 in establishing a global pro-Israel network to suppress BDS activity, and the use of anti-BDS laws as a key tactic: 14 US states have introduced such legislation.

Theresa May must listen to the growing chorus of voices calling for an approach that truly holds Israel to account

Sir Ross Cranstons judgment last week draws a line in the sand against the attempts to introduce such measures in the UK. It upholds the basic right to invest money on ethical principles.

For BDS campaigners in the UK this gives a huge boost to our work. A recent YouGov poll showed that public opinion is on our side with 43% of the public seeing BDS as a reasonable response to Israels policies and only 13% opposed. This judgment tells us that the law is with us as well. With this legal impediment removed, we will take forward the campaign to persuade all relevant bodies, including pension-fund holders, not to invest money in supporting activities that are illegal and violate human rights.

Margaret Thatcher found herself on the wrong side of history in the 1980s when she tried to prevent boycotts of apartheid South Africa. Last week, Theresa May told us that her government recognised the need to be humble, to listen to public opinion and rethink its approach to a range of issues. Its time for her to acknowledge that current policy in the Middle East has failed and to listen to the growing chorus of voices calling for an approach that truly holds Israel to account.

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This ruling allows councils to boycott Israel. It's a crucial victory - The Guardian