Son of God was born on 25th December?

When you are wishing someone 'Merry Christmas', without you realize, you are agreeing that God has a son and he (the Son of God) was born on 25th December. Astagfirullah Al Azim..

Saying God has children is a Shirk (the greatest sin in Islam), as Allah says in the Qur'an: "Allah begets not, nor was He begotten" [Quran, 112: 3]

Transitional Leader Calls for Sharia Law as Country Celebrates

TRIPOLI, Libya –  The transitional government leader Mustafa Abdul-Jalil called on Libyans to show "patience, honesty and tolerance" and eschew hatred as they embark on rebuilding the country at the end of an 8-month civil war.

Abdul-Jalil set out a vision for the post-Qaddafi future with an Islamist tint, saying that Islamic Sharia law would be the "basic source" of legislation in the country and that existing laws that contradict the teachings of Islam would be nullified. 

In a gesture that showed his own piety, he urged Libyans not to express their joy by firing in the air, but rather to chant "Allahu Akbar," or God is Great. He then stepped aside and knelt to offer a brief prayer of thanks.

"This revolution was looked after by God to achieve victory," he told the crowd at the declaration ceremony in the eastern city of Benghazi, the birthplace of the uprising against Qaddafi began. He thanked those who fell in the fight against Qaddafi's forces. "This revolution began peacefully to demand the minimum of legitimate rights, but it was met by excessive violence."

Tens of thousands gathered in the eastern city of Benghazi Sunday as Libya's transitional leader declared his country's liberation, three days after ousted dictator Muammar Qaddafi was captured and killed.

President Obama congratulated Libya on their declaration of liberation.

"After four decades of brutal dictatorship and eight months of deadly conflict, the Libyan people can now celebrate their freedom and the beginning of a new era of promise," Obama said in a statement.

"We look forward to working with the NTC and an empowered transitional government as they prepare for the country's first free and fair elections," Obama said.

The liberation celebration was clouded, however, by mounting calls for an investigation into whether Qaddafi was executed while in custody.

An autopsy confirmed that Qaddafi died from a gunshot to the head, Libya's chief pathologist, Dr. Othman al-Zintani, said hours before the liberation declaration was to start the clock on a transition to democracy.

However, the pathologist said he would not disclose further details or elaborate on Qaddafi's final moments, saying he would first deliver a full report to the attorney general. Libya's acting prime minister said he would not oppose an investigation, but cited an official reporting saying a wounded Qaddafi was killed in cross-fire following his capture.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Britain's new defense secretary, Philip Hammond, said a full investigation is necessary.

The Libyan revolutionaries' image had been "a little bit stained" by Qaddafi's death, Hammond said Sunday, adding that the new government "will want to get to the bottom of it in a way that rebuilds and cleanses that reputation."

"It's certainly not the way we do things," Hammond told BBC television. "We would have liked to see Col. Qaddafi going on trial to answer for his misdeeds."

Clinton told NBC's "Meet the Press" that she backs a proposal that the United Nations investigate Qaddafi's death and that Libya's National Transitional Council look into the circumstances, too.

The 69-year-old Qaddafi was captured wounded, but alive Thursday in his hometown of Sirte, the last city to fall to revolutionary forces. Bloody images of Qaddafi being taunted and beaten by his captors have raised questions about whether he was killed in crossfire as suggested by government officials or deliberately executed.

Qaddafi's body has been on public display in a commercial freezer in a shopping center in the port city of Misrata, which suffered from a bloody siege by regime forces that instilled a virulent hatred for the dictator in Misrata's residents. People have lined up for days to view the body, which was laid out on a mattress on the freezer floor. The bodies of Qaddafi's son Muatassim and his ex-defense minister Abu Bakr Younis also were put on display, and people wearing surgical masks have filed past, snapping photos of the bodies.

The New York-based group Human Rights Watch, which viewed the bodies, said video footage, photos and other information it obtained "indicate that they might have been executed after being detained."

"Finding out how they died matters," said Sarah Leah Whitson of Human Rights Watch. "It will set the tone for whether the new Libya will be ruled by law or by summary violence."

The Syrian-based Al-Rai TV station, which has served as a mouthpiece for the Qaddafi clan, said the dictator's wife, Safiya, also demanded an investigation.

"I am proud of the bravery of my husband, Muammar Qaddafi, the holy warrior, and my sons who confronted the aggression of 40 countries over the past six months," the station quoted the widow as saying in a statement.

Jibril, the acting Libyan prime minister, said he would not oppose an inquiry into Qaddafi's death, but that there is "no reason" to doubt the credibility of an official report that the ousted leader died in cross-fire.

"Have you seen a video of somebody killing him? I haven't seen any video tape or mobile film that shows somebody is killing Qaddafi," Jibril told reporters in Jordan where he was attending an international economic conference.

"What I told the press several times ... (is) that coroner says in the medical report that he (Qaddafi) was already wounded, taken out, put in that truck and on the way to the field hospital there was cross-fire from both sides," Jibril said. Jibril said it's unclear whether the fatal bullet was fired by loyalists or revolutionary forces.

The vast majority of Libyans seemed unconcerned about the circumstances of the hated leader's death, but rather was relieved the country's ruler of 42 years was gone, clearing the way for a new beginning.

"If he (Qaddafi) was taken to court, this would create more chaos, and would encourage his supporters," said Salah Zlitni, 31, who owns a pizza parlor in downtown Tripoli. "Now it's over."

The long-awaited declaration of liberation starts the clock on Libya's transition to democracy. The transitional leadership has said it would declare a new interim government within a month of liberation and elections for a constitutional assembly within eight months, to be followed by votes for a parliament and president within a year.

At the ceremony in Benghazi, Abdul-Jalil outlined several changes to align with Islamic law.

"This revolution was looked after by God to achieve victory," he said.

Abdul-Jalil said new banks would be set up to follow the Islamic banking system, which bans charging interest as a practice deemed usury. For the time being, he said interest would be canceled from any personal loans already taken out and less than $7,500.

He also announced the annulment of an existing family law that limits the number of wives Libyan can take, contradicting the provision in the Muslim holy book, the Quran, that allows men up to four wives.

And he urged Libyans to hand back money or property taken during the civil war.

Abdul-Jalil thanked those who fought and fell in the fight against Qaddafi's forces.

"They are somewhere better than here, with God," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/10/23/calls-for-investigation-as-autopsy-reveals-qaddafi-died-from-gunshot-to-head/

1,000-liter ‘teapot’ for Haj use

By BADEA ABU AL-NAJA | ARAB NEWS

MAKKAH: An engineer working for the Tawafa Establishment for South Asian Pilgrims has developed an electric heater that can boil up to 1,000 liters of water to make tea and other hot drinks.

While commending the efforts of Abdul Aziz Mahboub, electrical engineer at the Tawafa’s field office No. 23, chairman of the Tawafa establishment Adnan Katib called on other field offices to benefit from the equipment, which fulfills hygienic and security specifications.

Mahboub told Arab News that his new system would make available tea and coffee to pilgrims in crowded tents at any time, day or night, without the assistance of tea boys.

The number of pilgrims in a normal pilgrim tent reaches up to 5,000 and a number of tea boys are required to serve them. He said the 1,000-liter tank will have to be heated initially for two hours and a continuous water supply could be ensured with a buoy-like device.

The equipment is priced approximately at SR15,000, including installation costs, and will have a 10-year operating life.

The external wall of the tank is heat-insulated with a fiberglass cover to protect users. The tank has nine outlets and can serve 6,000 paper cups. An inbuilt stainless steel boiler enables the preparation of tea.

Head of the field office Talal Mahboub has personally funded the development and installation of the system, the engineer said.

He added that the device was ideal for pilgrim camps and other large gatherings because of its safety and hygiene levels.

By installing the system, which minimizes the risk of fires in pilgrim camps, Tawafa establishments can save on wages of tea makers and suppliers, Mahboub said. The equipment can be operated anywhere and can easily be transported from one location to another, he added.

http://arabnews.com/saudiarabia/article517640.ece

Learning about Islam in the Maldives

By Idris Tawfiq - The Egyptian Gazette Monday, October 17, 2011 08:08:23 PM With an average land height of just one and a half metres above sea level, the Republic of Maldives in the Indian Ocean is the lowest country in the world.  It is also, probably the most beautiful place on earth I have ever visited. The highest point on any of the country's nearly one thousand idyllic islands is just 2.3 metres above sea level. Little wonder, then, that Climate Change and Global Warming are a cause for real concern, since it would take only a very small rise in sea level to make the islands disappear altogether.
Whilst the government of the Maldives is doing everything possible to make the world aware of their plight, there is another consideration which puts all of this into its true perspective. For Muslims, all things come from Allah. In everything they do they declare, "inshallah." Even the sun coming up in the morning depends on His will.  Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) urged his followers to "tie your camel, then trust in Allah." In other words, Muslims should do everything they possibly can, and then when they have done everything they put their trust and their faith in the One who controls all things.         On approaching Male, the capital of the Maldives, from the air, the most immediate impression is how beautiful the islands are. Upon arrival at the airport, visitors are reminded of this in a peculiar way. In most of the world's airports, travelers are asked to declare if they are bringing drugs or alcohol into the country. In the Maldives, they are not only asked this, but also if they are carrying idols of worship, which, being anathema to Muslims, are similarly banned.           Islam came to the Maldive islands in the twelfth century. It was another of those countries never approached by Muslim armies, but by traders from the Arab world. Their example eventually led the whole population to embrace Islam. In a country which rejoices in being one hundred per cent Muslim, one of the first things visitors see as they travel by boat to the nation's capital is the splendid golden dome of the Sultan Mosque.         Egypt’s Al-Azhar has always played a central role in leading and guiding the Muslim world. The Islamic Centre in Male, which is a truly impressive building and which incorporates the country's largest Mosque, was built with the help of many Arab and Muslim nations.          This is a visible sign of the unity and brotherhood which exists among Muslims. The Opening Ceremony was attended by the late Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, Sheikh Jadul-Haqq, who traveled to the Maldives in November 1984 especially for this. Even today there is an Al-Azhar school in Male.         There is only one Islam. The beauty of Islam, though, is that it has so many beautiful faces throughout the world. These faces don't change Islam, since Islam is at home in every country and in every culture, but they do show its colours and its diversity. In fact, they show how practical and sensible Islam has been throughout the centuries in making its message relevant to all people on the face of this earth. The Maldivian people have their own very beautiful portrayal of Islam.          In fact, no matter how beautiful the sea or how white the sand, or even how peaceful the atmosphere, the real treasure of the Maldive islands is the friendliness and simplicity of its people. As Muslims we should never forget the real treasure of ordinary Muslims that is always in our midst.         The Maldives, like every country, has its own particular problems. Sometimes, as Muslims, we get distracted by our own national situation and forget to look at the bigger picture. The bigger picture shows us that Islam is alive and well and that Muslims are thriving. Perhaps this is why Islam is now the fastest growing religion in the West.         In a sense, the people of the Maldives can cling so closely to Islam because of their very way of life. This way of life has something to teach us all. Many of its people are fishermen, at one with the sea and its seasons, and they are in tune with their Creator. It is when we become so sophisticated and so caught up with the affairs of this world that we begin to lose something of Islam's simplicity.       Islam is indeed simple, but we have managed to make it seem so complicated. Anyone staying in the Maldives for even a short time is reminded just by being there that we need to remain focused on Allah, not on the things of this world. When we do remain focused on Allah, all things fall quite naturally into perspective and we see that all things come to us from the hand of Allah. With such an attitude, there is nothing that can overcome us – not even Climate Change and Global Warming!   The author of eight books about Islam, British Muslim writer, IdrisTawfiq, divides his time between Egypt and the UK  as a speaker, writer and broadcaster. You can visit his website at www.idristawfiq.com   http://213.158.162.45/~egyptian/index.php?action=news&id=21706&title=Culture:%20Learning%20about%20Islam%20in%20the%20Maldives

Why democracy is so good

Since 1973, approximately 50 million babies have been slaughtered in the United States before they were even born.

It is estimated that 500,000 babies that will be born this year will be sexually abused before they turn 18.

Law enforcement officials estimate that about 600,000 Americans and about 65,000 Canadians are trading dirty child pictures online.

More pornography is created in the United States than anywhere else on the entire globe. 89 percent is made in the U.S.A. and only 11 percent is made in the rest of the world.

The United States has more people on pharmaceutical drugs than any other country on the planet.

The United States has the highest divorce rate on the globe by a wide margin.

There are more than 3 million reports of child abuse in the United States every single year.

In the United States today, it is estimated that one out of every four girls is sexually abused before they become adults.

Maldivians voice against US Green Card Gambling

A group of about 100 Maldivians have petitioned Islamic Ministry to prevent the activities carried out in Maldives by US Embassy officials to recruit Maldivians to the Green Card Lottery programme. 

A petition signed by 107 people described the activities carried out by officials of the US Embassy in Colombo as “an addition to the different efforts by non-Muslims to introduce poker to the Maldives”. US Embassy officials held public presentations in Addu City on Saturday and in Male last evening to provide information about the Green Card Lottery programme.

US Embassy’s Visa Section head William Dova told an audience of about 50 last evening that winners of the lottery should pay visa fees despite the registration being open for free. The Green Card winners are eligible to apply for US citizenship after five years of residence in the country, he added. Registration for the Green Card Lottery programme will open on October 4 and will continue until November 5. 

The lottery is gambling, which is haraam. Allah, may He be exalted, says in His Book (interpretation of the meaning): “O you who believe! Intoxicants (all kinds of alcoholic drinks), and gambling, and Al‑Ansaab (stone altars for sacrifices to idols etc), and Al‑Azlaam (arrows for seeking luck or decision) are an abomination of Shaytaan’s (Satan’s) handiwork. So avoid (strictly all) that (abomination) in order that you may be successful. 91. Shaytaan (Satan) wants only to excite enmity and hatred between you with intoxicants (alcoholic drinks) and gambling, and hinder you from the remembrance of Allaah and from As‑Salaah (the prayer). So, will you not then abstain?” [al-Maa’idah 5:60-61].

Maldivians in Kochi under scanner

KOCHI: City has been becoming a home to lot of people from various parts of the country. But the presence of many Maldivians in the city has forced the Special Branch to conduct a thorough checking of the various pockets in the city where Maldivians have been found camping.

Though the city police have not come across any incidents of smuggling or anti-national activities involving Maldivians, they have launched the drive as part of a precautionary measure.

"We don't know why there has been a surge in the arrival of people from Maldives to the city.

The special branch wing has been able to identify an area near Karugapilly in the city where large number of Maldivians has been staying," said M N Ramesh, city special branch assistant commissioner.

The official said the police had conducted a preliminary enquiry to identify the reasons for the rise in arrival of Maldivians and it had been ascertained that these people were gradually moving out of Thiruvananthapuram,where they usually camp, due to various reasons.

Ramesh said that most of Maldivians staying in the city have been making use of a loop hole in the visa rules to stay permanently in the city.

"According to the rules, people from Maldives can stay in India continuously for 90 days without visa. What they usually do is to leave India on the 89th day and return the next day.

They keep on doing this to stay permanently in India," the official said."Most of them come to Kochi for business purpose. We intercepted a couple of Maldivians on suspicion and found that they were carrying large quantity of spare parts of various vehicles.

They brought the spare parts from various shops in Kochi," said the sources in the state police.

The sources added that they would be coordinating with the immigration wing of airports in the state, mainly Thiruvananthapuram, to ascertain the exact number of Maldivians landing in the state. 

 

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kochi/Maldivians-in-Kochi-under-scanner/articleshow/9829007.cms

Woman disables anti-Islam websites

DAMMAM: An Alkhobar woman studying in the United States is taking credit for destroying 23 Danish websites that denigrated the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), Al-Madinah newspaper reported on Thursday.

Nouf Rashid told the Arabic newspaper she was hacking into Danish websites having references to cartoons of the Prophet along with other sites that had questionable content in her view.

She said she had also destroyed a number of pornographic sites and hacked into the computer systems of young men who had tried to blackmail girls by threatening to publish their private photos. She gained expertise in the field out of a desire to learn new things in the IT field.

Nouf said she entered the hacking world to save a girl who was being blackmailed by a young man who wanted to marry her and had obtained a private photo of her. The victim’s friend had requested Nouf to look for a hacker in the US to save her from the man.

“In fact, I contacted some of my hacker friends at university and I learned from them the art of hacking,” she said.

“After this, I took the opportunity to save many women from youths who tried to blackmail them using their pictures. By the grace of God I was able to hack into their systems and erase most of their photos.”

Nouf said she had hacked into some of the Danish websites that denigrated the Prophet and shut them down. “I also sent messages and articles about Islam and the Prophet to those who managed those sites,” she pointed out.

Nouf urged girls to be cautious when using the Internet and not to open any suspicious e-mails. “We should take adequate protective measures. When doing computer maintenance, we should approach companies and individuals whom they can trust, because some workers in maintenance centers plant viruses that can spy on their clients,” she said.

According to Western media sources, more than 900 Danish websites have been hacked by groups in many countries along with individual hackers recently.

The BBC reported that the attacks typically replace home pages with pro-Islam messages and condemn the publication of the blasphemous images of the Prophet.

“We have never seen so many defacements that are politically targeted in such a short time,” Roberto Preatoni of the Internet monitoring group Zone H told BBC. He noted that most of the interference involves defacement of the website although some of the hackers have threatened the Danish people with revenge.

Like the United States, Saudi Arabia also maintains tough hacking laws with penalties up to 10 years in prison and fines up to $1.8 million.

Preatoni told BBC that most of the sites targeted were run by small organizations and companies that do not have dedicated security workers and cannot keep up with the latest alerts and patches for vulnerabilities. However, he noted that many of the sites had been restored within 24 hours.

Source: Arabnews

King Abdullah to lay foundation stone to Makkah Haram expansion works

JEDDAH: Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah will lay the foundation stone to the Makkah Haram expansion works in a few days. The project is called the King Abdullah Expansion of the Makkah Haram.

The king will also open a number of other development projects that aim to improve the safety and comfort of pilgrims at the two holy mosques and holy sites.

The projects currently underway at the Haram include the expansion of the northern courtyard of the Grand Mosque, the Masaa (the running course between Al-Safa and Al-Marwah,) the King Abdul Aziz Endowment Project, the King Abdul Aziz Road, the Mashair Railway connecting Mina, Arafat and Muzdalifah, the Haramain Railway to link the two holy cities of Makkah and Madinah, the Central Zone Development project and new circular roads in addition to flood drainage projects in the holy sites and the Al-Jamarat complex, Al-Riyadh daily reported on Thursday.

The project at the Prophet’s Mosque in Madinah include the expansion of the courtyards around the mosque in all directions so that its capacity climbs to 350,000 people.

The huge projects implemented at the orders of the king include the development of the Al-Jamarat Bridge with the aim of increasing its capacity to 5 million pilgrims and the Mashair Railway that is scheduled to become fully operational before the beginning of the upcoming Haj in November. The metro service will operate 17 trains with 12 coaches in each train. A train will carry 3,000 pilgrims.

The development of the King Abdul Aziz Endowment project comprises six residential towers and a five-star hotel. The frontal towers of the towers are 28 stories high while the rear towers are 35 stories. Its side towers are 45 stories high while the hotel tower is 60 stories. The entire complex with 11,000 rooms and suites will accommodate 35,000 pilgrims.

The water management project in the holy sites includes construction of several feeder canals to gather floodwater from nearby mountains and a number of check dams and subterranean ducts.

The canals will start from the foot of the Eastern Ras Al-Shoayb mountain and will extend to the border of Mina at the King Fahd Tunnel.

The project also includes three concrete check dams on the basin of the flood course to the north of Mina and at the western side of the Al-Shoayb mountain and at the north of the King Khaled Road near the Square 28 and the Magar Kabsh area.

Another tunnel will be built to channel the floodwater collected on the other side of the Magar Kabsh dam to the western side of the Al-Shoayb mountain. Tunnels will also be built to carry the water to Al-Moaysim side.

arabnews

World has more private security guards than police

By ROBERT EVANS | REUTERS

GENEVA: The private security industry is growing rapidly around the globe and employs twice as many people as governments have police officers, according to an authoritative report issued on Wednesday.

The documented 20 million security guards, representing an increase of between 200-300 percent over the past two to three decades, form an industry whose rapid growth “has outpaced regulation and oversight mechanisms,” it said.

Efforts at the international level to fill in regulatory gaps were at a very early stage, according to the Small Arms Survey, based on a review of 70 countries.

The survey is produced annually by a team of experts based at Geneva University’s Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies and tracks trade in the weaponry and moves to control it.

The latest edition puts the total trade in small weapons — like handguns — and light weapons — which include mortars, grenade launchers, recoilless rifles and portable missiles and rockets — as running at $7.1 billion a year.

It also says the trade in light weapons, which account for $1.1 billion of the total, “is significantly less transparent than the trade in other weapons, including small arms,” saying only a fifth of it is officially recorded.

In 2008, the last year for which figures could be compiled, the United States, as in previous years, was both the top importer and top exporter of small and light weapons, according to the survey.

As an exporter it was followed by Italy, Germany, Brazil and Switzerland, with Israel, Austria, South Korea, Belgium, Russia, Spain, Turkey, Norway and Canada also exporting this weaponry to a value of over $100 million a year each.

Behind the United States as importers at over $100 million annually were Canada, Britain, Germany, Australia, France and Pakistan, said the survey, which did not give a breakdown of each country’s imports and exports.

“Despite evidence that some private security companies have engaged in the illegal acquisition of firearms, have lost weapons through theft, or have misused their arsenals, there is no systematic reporting of such misconduct,” the report said.

Firms working in Iraq and Afghanistan had been equipped with fully automatic assault rifles, machine guns, sniper rifles and in some cases rocket-propelled grenade launchers, “raising questions about their stated defensive roles,” it declared.

Overall, the private firms hold up to 3.7 million firearms worldwide, more if undeclared and illegally held weapons could be included, against 26 million held by police and 200 million by armed forces, according to the survey.

Outside of armed conflict settings, it said, private security companies in Latin America had the biggest arsenals with ratios of weapons per employee about 10 times higher than those for their counterparts in Europe.

Blogger's note: This shows the need for islamic sharia in the world. Isn't it?

A ferry to the Maldives in 30 hours

Ruchika Chitravanshi / New Delhi July 10, 2011, 0:00 IST

Travelling to the Maldives might just get a little more exciting with the government now considering starting a sea route facility to the smallest Asian country. The shipping ministry in order to boost tourism to and from the Maldives will run a passenger liner for travellers either from Cochin port or the Tuticorin port.

“We are examining the projects. We are in discussion with the Maldives government on the modalities for a ferry service and development of ports for trade and tourism,” said K Mohandas, secretary-shipping ministry. A delegation led by the secretary, shipping, along with chairpersons of Cochin and Tuticorin Port Trust, an official from DG Shipping and Shipping Corporation of India are currently visiting the Maldives.

The sea route to the Maldives is expected to take about 30 hours to travel. The cost parameters are still being studied. Government officials will visit the ports as well as the Maldives to understand the demand and the economic viability of the project. “At this stage, we don’t have any details about the cost and frequency of such a service to the Maldives. But after Sri Lanka, this is the second neighbouring country to which we want to provide easy access,” Mohandas added.

Last month, the shipping ministry started a sea route to Sri Lanka from the Tuticorin port. The shipping service, which runs twice a week, costs about $50 for a passenger, with travelling time of 12 hours. The ship called Scotia Prince with capacity to ferry 1,044 passengers is operated by Flemingo Liners.

The Maldives is towards south of Lakshadweep Islands where the Indian Navy had captured 28 Somali pirates in February this year. “The Indian Navy has been guarding the area very well ever since the last incident occurred. Security will not be an issue,” Mohandas said.

According to tourist arrival figures of the Maldives for 2009, China ranks fourth among the top 10 tourism destinations, with over 69,000 arrivals. India stands at the 10th position with over 15,800 tourists visiting the country. In 2009, the Maldives’ total tourist arrivals were 655,852.

http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/a-ferry-tomaldives-in-30-hours/442157/

A small number of Sri Lankan women are forced into prostitution in the Maldives

Although Sri Lanka does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking the country is making significant efforts to do so, the 2011 Trafficking in Persons Report released Monday by the United States Secretary of State Hilary Clinton which placed Sri Lanka among Tier 2 countries said.

Tier 2 countries are the countries whose governments do not fully comply with the minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) but are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those standards.

Sri Lanka is yet to ratify the United Nations TIP protocol of 2000, the protocol to prevent, suppress, and punish trafficking in persons, especially women and children.

The report noted that the Sri Lankan government convicted three traffickers, in the first case under its anti-trafficking legislation, and rejuvenated its inter-agency task force.

However, serious problems remain unaddressed, such as the detention of identified trafficking victims (including those who provided evidence to support the three convictions), the failure to achieve criminal convictions for fraudulent recruitment agencies involved in trafficking in persons, and official complicity in human trafficking, the TIP Report noted.

The Sri Lankan government increased law enforcement efforts in addressing human trafficking cases over the reporting period. Sri Lanka prohibits all forms of trafficking through an April 2006 amendment to its penal code, which prescribes punishments of up to 20 years imprisonment. These penalties are sufficiently stringent and commensurate with those prescribed for other serious offenses, such as rape. Amendments passed in 2009 to the Foreign Employment Act expanded the powers of the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) to prosecute recruitment agents who engage in fraudulent recruitment, prescribing a maximum penalty of four years imprisonment and fines of $1,000, and restricting the amount that employment agents can charge. It added.

The report said Sri Lanka is primarily a source and to a much lesser extent, a destination for men, women, and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking.

The TIP report recommended among other things for the government of Sri Lanka to vigorously investigate and prosecute suspected trafficking offenses, and convict and punish trafficking offenders, particularly those responsible for recruiting victims with fraudulent offers of employment and excessive commission fees for the purpose of subjecting them to forced labor.

Excerpt on Sri Lanka

SRI LANKA (Tier 2)

Sri Lanka is primarily a source and, to a much lesser extent, a destination for men, women, and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking. Sri Lankan men, women, and some children (between 16 and 17 years old) migrate consensually to Kuwait, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Oman, Bahrain, and Singapore to work as construction workers, domestic servants, or garment factory workers. Some of these workers, however, subsequently find themselves in conditions of forced labor through practices such as restrictions on movement, withholding of passports, threats, physical or sexual abuse, and threats of detention and deportation for immigration violations. Many of these migrants pay high recruitment fees usually about $1,500 imposed by unscrupulous licensed labor recruitment agencies and their unlicensed sub-agents and assume debt in order to satisfy these costs. This indebtedness contributes to debt bondage in destination countries. A recent Human Rights Watch report noted that over one-third of Sri Lankan domestic workers in Jordan are physically abused by their employers, 11 percent were sexually assaulted, 60 percent were not paid wages, over 60 percent had their passports confiscated, and 80 percent experienced forced confinement these are abuses that indicate forced labor. In the past year, there were high-profile reports of Sri Lankan domestic workers who were subjected to forced labor and physical abuse in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Jordan, including having more than 20 nails hammered in their bodies, or being forced to swallow nine nails. There were also reports of cases in which some Sri Lankan recruitment agencies committed fraud by engaging in contract-switching: promising one type of job and conditions but then changing the job, employer, conditions or salary after arrival, which are documented risk factors for forced labor and debt bondage. Sri Lanka is reported to be a transit country for men, some of whom may be trafficking victims, traveling from Pakistan and Bangladesh to Dubai, UAE. In several cases, men were stranded in Sri Lanka by the employment agent. Some Sri Lankan women were promised jobs as domestic workers in other countries, but after arriving were instead forced to work in brothels, mainly in Singapore. A small number of Sri Lankan women are forced into prostitution in the Maldives.

Within the country, women and children are subjected to sex trafficking in brothels, especially in the Anuradhapura area, which was a major transit point for members of the Sri Lankan Armed Forces heading north. Boys are more likely than girls to be forced into prostitution this is generally in coastal areas for domestic child sex tourism. In 2009, the National Child Protection Authority (NCPA) estimated that approximately 1,000 children were subjected to commercial sexual exploitation within Sri Lanka although some NGOs believed the actual number was between 10,000 and 15,000. NGOs expressed concern that the recent increase in tourism in the very poor post-conflict areas on the east coast may increase demand for child sex tourism. There are reports of children being subjected to bonded labor and forced labor in dry-zone farming areas on plantations, and in the fireworks and fish-drying industries. Some child domestic workers in Colombo, generally from the Tamil tea-estate sector of the country, are subjected to physical, sexual, and mental abuse, nonpayment of wages, and restrictions of their movement. Some women and children were promised garment industry work by agents and were instead forced into prostitution. A small number of women from Thailand, China, and countries in South Asia, Europe, and the former Soviet Union may be subjected to forced prostitution in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking however, it is making significant efforts to do so. The government convicted three traffickers, in the first case under its anti-trafficking legislation, and rejuvenated its inter-agency
task force. However, serious problems remain unaddressed, such as the detention of identified trafficking victims (including those who provided evidence to support the three convictions), the failure to achieve criminal convictions for fraudulent recruitment agencies involved in trafficking in persons, and official complicity in human trafficking.

Recommendations for Sri Lanka: Vigorously investigate and prosecute suspected trafficking offenses, and convict and punish trafficking offenders, particularly those responsible for recruiting victims with fraudulent offers of employment and excessive commission fees for the purpose of subjecting them to forced labor ensure that victims of trafficking found within Sri Lanka are not detained or otherwise penalized for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of their being trafficked, such as visa violations or prostitution establish law enforcement capacity at shelters in embassies abroad develop and implement formal victim referral procedures train local law enforcement and judicial officials on investigating and prosecuting trafficking crimes facilitate the speedy repatriation of foreign trafficking victims by providing airfare and not obligating them to remain in the country if they choose to initiate law enforcement proceedings provide witness protection and incentives for victims to cooperate with law enforcement to enable prosecutions stop the practice of forcing foreign trafficking victims to remain in Sri Lanka if they are witnesses in a case improve services, including quality of shelters, legal aid, availability of counseling, and numbers of trained staff at embassies and consular offices in destination countries promote safe tourism campaigns to ensure that child sex tourism does not increase with expected rapid growth of tourism and improve regulation and monitoring of recruitment agencies and village-level brokers, with an emphasis on ensuring provision of accurate and enforceable employment contracts and working to ending the charging of illegal and excessive fees.

Prosecution

The Sri Lankan government increased law enforcement efforts in addressing human trafficking cases over the reporting period. Sri Lanka prohibits all forms of trafficking through an April 2006 amendment to its penal code, which prescribes punishments of up to 20 years imprisonment. These penalties are sufficiently stringent and commensurate with those prescribed for other serious offenses, such as rape. Amendments passed in 2009 to the Foreign Employment Act expanded the powers of the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) to prosecute recruitment agents who engage in fraudulent recruitment, prescribing a maximum penalty of four years imprisonment and fines of $1,000, and restricting the amount that employment agents can charge. In March 2011, three traffickers were convicted and sentenced to nine years each for forcing women into prostitution, in one case. This is the first recorded convicted case under Sri Lanka s counter-trafficking amendment. However, the Uzbek sex trafficking victims in the case were detained in an immigration detention facility in Sri Lanka for over a year until their testimony was complete. The Attorney General s Department claimed two additional convictions in 2010 for violations of the penal code s statute on child sexual exploitation both convictions may have involved human trafficking crimes. Both convictions resulted in suspended jail sentences. Each trafficker had to pay a fine of approximately $900, and one had to pay compensation of $450 to the victim. In January 2011, the National Child Protection Authority (NCPA) completed an investigation and could not determine the whereabouts of the remaining boys allegedly in armed service with the Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP)/Karuna Faction some of these boys may be trafficking victims. There were no prosecutions against persons allegedly responsible for conscription of child soldiers.

During the year, there was some evidence of government officials complicity in trafficking. There were allegations that police and other officials accepted bribes to permit brothels to operate some of the brothels exploited trafficking victims. Many recruitment agencies were run by politicians or were politically connected. Some sub-agents cooperated with Sri Lankan officials to procure forged or modified documents, or real documents with false data, to facilitate travel abroad. There were no reported law enforcement actions taken against officials complicit in human trafficking. The Sri Lankan Police continued to teach a counter-trafficking module to all police recruits during their basic trainings. Additionally, police officers who were previously trained in IOM training-of-trainers courses conducted 16 training workshops at local police stations on counter-trafficking in the reporting period.


Protection

The government made limited progress in protecting victims of trafficking during the year. The government placed two Uzbek women who were found in forced prostitution in late 2009 in a detention center, which they were allowed to leave during the day but were locked up at night. The government did not permit them to leave Sri Lanka for over a year until they had the opportunity to provide testimony against their alleged traffickers, instead of allowing the Uzbeks to leave the country while their cases were pending or to remain in the country with protections such as immigration relief, freedom of movement, and the right to work. They were then given permission to leave the country, and with the assistance of IOM, departed Sri Lanka in December 2010. The government forces foreign trafficking victims to remain in Sri Lanka if they are witnesses in a case until evidence has been given. The government continued to provide some counseling and day care for abused children through the operation of six resource centers, although it is not known how many trafficked children, if any, were assisted in the reporting period. The Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) operated nine short-term shelters in 2010 in Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates as well as an overnight shelter in Sri Lanka s international airport for returning female migrant workers who encountered abuse abroad. It is unknown how many trafficking victims were assisted in these shelters in the reporting period. While the missions provide shelter and legal aid, domestic workers seeking assistance complained of long waiting periods with little information about their cases. In addition, there were complaints that the shelters were grossly overcrowded with unhygienic conditions. In a news report of female Sri Lankan workers who fled their employers in Jordan due to lack of paid wages and abuse, one worker noted that the Sri Lankan embassy shelter was no better than a prison, as it did not permit the domestic workers to leave the premises. There have been some reports of abuse by Sri Lankan embassy officials in shelters abroad.

A Workers Welfare Fund is maintained by the SLBFE, also funded by fees charged to workers upon migration. Through this fund, the widely reported case of the female in domestic servitude in Saudi Arabia who returned with 24 nails in her body received approximately $4,500 to build a house, with the assistance of the National Housing Authority. Neither the government nor NGOs or international organizations provided protection facilities for men. The Ministry of Child Development and Women s Affairs (MOCDWA) has a memorandum of understanding with IOM to establish a shelter which can house 10 to 15 women and child victims of trafficking and abuse. When the building is renovated and prepared with a tentative deadline of later this year the ministry will take over operation and management of the shelter.

Government personnel did not employ formal procedures for proactively identifying victims. The National Counter Human Trafficking Resource Center of the Sri Lanka Department of Immigration and Emigration trained 10 immigration officers on the identification of trafficking victims, in partnership with IOM, in 2010 50 officers were trained in 2009. The government pursued a partnership with the Salvation Army to transfer women and child victims of abuse to protection facilities, though it is unknown how many trafficking victims, if any, were referred in the reporting period. Foreign trafficking victims could not seek employment in Sri Lanka. The government permitted foreign trafficking victims to leave the country unless they were witnesses in a case, in which case the government forced them to remain until evidence had been given. IOM reported several cases of victims who chose to leave the country rather than file a complaint. The Commissioner General for Rehabilitation, with the assistance of the NCPA, continued to operate two rehabilitation centers specifically for children involved in armed conflict, some of whom may be trafficking victims, in partnership with UNICEF. The Commission also continued to run a vocational training center with donor support. These facilities served approximately 700 former child soldiers in the reporting period. The Sri Lankan government has reported that all former Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) child soldiers completed rehabilitation and were released in May 2010. However, at least 250 children formerly associated with armed groups faced a number of security issues, and some were arrested by police.

The government did not encourage victims to assist in the investigation and prosecution of trafficking cases instead, they sometimes forced victims to testify if they chose to file charges. While Sri Lankan trafficking victims in theory could file administrative cases to seek financial restitution, this did not happen in practice due to victim embarrassment and the slow pace of the Sri Lankan legal system. In addition, prosecutors were prevented under Sri Lankan law from meeting with witnesses outside of formal court proceedings. Thus, they had to rely on police to convince a witness to testify. The government penalized adult victims of trafficking through detention for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficked. Most commonly, these acts were violations of their visa status or prostitution. All detainees who were awaiting deportation for visa violations, including trafficking victims, remained in detention facilities until they raised enough money to pay for their plane ticket home, which in some cases has taken years. The government provided no legal alternatives for the removal of foreign victims to countries where they may face hardship or retribution. The SLBFE continued to provide training on protection and assistance to its staff members who worked at embassies and consulates in foreign countries, although many of the labor attaches working in labor-receiving countries are political appointees who do not receive any training.

Prevention

The Sri Lankan government made some progress in its efforts to prevent trafficking during the last year. The government formed an inter-ministerial anti-trafficking task force in October 2010, led by a coordinator from the Ministry of Justice, and developed a terms of reference on how government agencies will work together to combat trafficking. This task force took over the monthly meetings previously held by the MOCDWA, and met six times in the reporting period. While it does not include civil society, the coordinator of the task force recently announced it would soon open up quarterly meetings to NGOs and community organizations. The government limits the recruitment fees to $70 for jobs paying less than $200 per month and $100 for jobs paying over $200. The SLBFE requires migrant domestic workers with no experience working in the Middle East to complete a free 12-day pre-departure training course. It is not known how many migrant workers completed this course in the reporting period. The SLBFE and the Department of Labor conducted awareness programs on safe migration. In measures that could prevent transnational labor trafficking of Sri Lankans, the SLBFE reported that it filed 727 charges against recruitment agencies in 2010 under Sections 398 (cheating) and 457 (forgery for the purpose of cheating), conducted 84 raids against employment agents, and fined recruitment agencies found to be guilty of fraudulent practices over $40,000. The Criminal Investigation Division of the police, in cooperation with Interpol and the Royal Malaysian Police, investigated four fraudulent recruitment agents who may have been responsible for the forced labor of Sri Lankans in Malaysia.

While most Sri Lankans have birth certificates and (after the age of 16) national identity cards, many of the 250,000 to 350,000 internally displaced people a group very vulnerable to trafficking did not have these documents. The Government of Sri Lanka continued to provide personnel time to conduct mobile documentation clinics for conflict-affected people with UNDP. The Government of Sri Lanka did not report any efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts during the reporting period. The Ministry of Defense provided training to all Sri Lankan peacekeepers prior to their deployments for international peacekeeping missions relating to human rights, including trafficking. Sri Lanka is not a party to the 2000 UN TIP Protocol.

http://www.lankanewspapers.com/news/2011/6/68443.html

Calif. Muslims, Jews File Lawsuit Against Circumcision Ban

The recent efforts to ban circumcision in San Francisco have brought about one curious unintended result: Muslim and Jewish Americans have teamed up in the city to file a lawsuit against the ballot measure. The “unlikely coalition,” as dubbed by The Blaze, was formed because the ritual of circumcision is common to both the Muslim and Jewish faiths.

Now that San Francisco election officials have confirmed that there are enough signatures to qualify the initiative for the ballot, the city will be the first to hold a public vote on banning male circumcision. If passed, the measure would prohibit circumcision on males under the age of 18, making it a misdemeanor punishable by either a fine of up to $1,000 or up to a year in jail.

It is because the measure would permit no exemptions, including for religious reasons, that Jewish and Muslim residents are collaborating in the lawsuit. The Blaze notes,

The case filed in San Francisco Superior Court asks the court to remove the voter initiative from the city’s Nov. 8 ballot, arguing that California law bars local governments from restricting medical procedures.

The lawsuit includes five Jewish and three Muslim plaintiffs, as well as two physicians who regularly perform circumcisions. It also includes the Anti-Defamation League and the local chapter of the Jewish Community Relations Council as plaintiffs.

Leticia Preza, one of the plaintiffs in the case, declares of the proposed ban:

It’s a measure that would basically infringe upon my rights as a Muslim to practice here. It would also take away my rights as a parent to choose what’s a good procedure for my child.

Supporters of the ban contend that circumcision is equitable to genital mutilation and conclude that it should not be imposed on children by their parents. They claim the procedure is too painful and dangerous to justify its continued use.

"Parents are really guardians, and guardians have to do what's in the best interest of the child. It's his body. It's his choice," claimed Lloyd Schofield, the measure's lead proponent and a longtime San Francisco resident.

The New American's Daniel Sayani notes dissembling in this assertion, however:

Yet, this is a position that reeks of hypocrisy, as the same anti-circumcision individuals often support a pro-choice position on abortion, arbitrarily defending a born child’s supposed “right” not be circumcised, while supporting the “right” of an individual parent to legally kill their unborn children as late as 36 weeks of pregnancy (approximately nine months of gestation). In fact, San Francisco’s permissive culture has been warmly embracing of several abortionists and even late-term abortion practitioners: According to attorney Leonard Moscowitz, “It is amazing that in San Francisco, you can abort a 5, 6, or 7 month old baby, but you soon may not perform a circumcision on a 9 month, 8 day-old baby.”

Meanwhile, the ban has provoked a great deal of ire from both the religious and medical communities, as well as from constitutionalists who take issue with the local government's overreach. The Blaze indicates:

The ballot measure is running into fierce opposition, especially among Jews and Muslims who consider circumcision a sacred religious rite. They say the ban would violate their constitutional rights and run counter to San Francisco’s tradition of cultural and religious tolerance.

International health organizations have promoted male circumcision to help reduce the spread of the AIDS virus, but there hasn’t been the same kind of push in the U.S., in part because nearly 80 percent of American men are already circumcised, compared with the worldwide average of 30 percent.

TNA's Sayani noted the number of health benefits associated with circumcision:

There is ample medical evidence that circumcision is linked to lower rates of penile cancer, thrush infections, balanitis (inflammation of the glans), posthitis and phimosis (two other severe inflammatory conditions), sexual dysfunction, and a reduction in HIV/AIDS and Human Papilloma Virus (HPV, which is linked to sexually-transmitted cervical cancer) transmission rates (in African and other developing societies) as well as improved hygiene.

Plaintiff Jeremy Benjamin voiced his concern over the ban: “As Jews, we take the threat of banning circumcision personally. This measure singles us out, along with the Muslim community, as illegitimate and unwanted in our own city.”

The city of Santa Monica was considering a similar ban, until the author of Santa Monica’s proposal, Matthew Hess, created an anti-Semitic comic called Foreskin Man. What Hess called a “joke” and “publicity stunt” ultimately revealed what many believed to be an underlying anti-Semitic position behind the circumcision ban. The comic provoked such a public outcry that the city of Santa Monica elected to drop the proposal.

Jena Troutman, who originally submitted the initiative to the Santa Monica city clerk, retracted her proposal, telling the Jewish Journal, “It shouldn’t have been about religion in the first place. Ninety-five percent of people aren’t doing it for religious reasons, and with everyone from the New York Times to Glenn Beck focusing on the religious issue, it’s closing Americans down to the conversation.”

As of now, the circumcision ban in San Francisco is scheduled to appear on the ballot in November. Whether the lawsuit will remove the measure from the ballot remains to be seen.

http://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/faith-and-morals/7981-calif-muslims-jews-file-lawsuit-against-circumcision-ban

The Imperialist Suicide Epidemic in India

by Larry Everest

"The children were inconsolable. Mute with shock and fighting back tears, they huddled beside their mother as friends and neighbors prepared their father's body for cremation on a blazing bonfire built on the cracked, barren fields near their home. As flames consumed the corpse, Ganjanan, 12, and Kalpana, 14, faced a grim future. While Shankara Mandaukar had hoped his son and daughter would have a better life under India's economic boom, they now face working as slave labor for a few pence a day. Landless and homeless, they will be the lowest of the low.

"Shankara, respected farmer, loving husband and father, had taken his own life. Less than 24 hours earlier, facing the loss of his land due to debt, he drank a cupful of chemical insecticide. Unable to pay back the equivalent of two years' earnings, he was in despair. He could see no way out."1

Shankara's story is not unique—or even unusual. Between 1995 and 2009, 241,679 farmers in India committed suicide, and by the end of 2010 the number had probably risen to 250,000—a quarter of a million people. In 2009 alone, 17,638 farmers committed suicide—an average of one every 30 minutes.

And it's even worse. These shocking figures "considerably underestimate the actual number of farmer suicides taking place," according to a new study by the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at New York University Law School, "Every Thirty Minutes: Farmer Suicides, Human Rights and the Agrarian Crisis in India."2 For instance, women are often excluded from suicide statistics because they don't have title to their land and therefore are not counted as "farmers."
The Roots of India's Farmer Suicide Epidemic

This suicide epidemic is not a product of "human nature," or India's culture. Mass farmer suicides were unknown in India before the 1990s. Nor are they random and unexplainable: they follow a pattern. 86.5 percent of the farmers who commit suicide are in debt. Like Shankara, 40 percent had suffered a crop failure, the majority are small farmers (with less than five acres of land), and are growing cash crops for export. Cotton is one of India's main cash crops, and one of the highest concentrations of suicides is among cotton farmers like Shankara. Roughly half of all farmer suicides occur in the Vidarbha region of central India, where there are 3.2 million cotton farmers.3

What is the connection between crushing debt, failed harvests, small plots, and cash crops? Why have hundreds of thousands felt they had no way out but to take their own lives? What does this epidemic show about India, a country the U.S. lauds as "the world's largest democracy" and celebrates as a model for economic development? And what does it show about U.S. capitalism-imperialism and how it impacts millions upon millions around the world?
Step Back... and Survey the Globe

To answer these questions, we can't just look at India's cotton industry, or Indian agriculture overall, or even just India. You have to step back and look at what kind of system we live in, how it dominates and shapes the whole globe—especially oppressed countries like India.

We live in a capitalist system. That means that all production, including of basic necessities, is driven and shaped by the maximizing of profit. Today the tentacles of that capitalist system envelop the whole world—capitalism has become imperialism. A small handful of rich, capitalist-imperialist countries dominate the rest of the planet, with the United States at the top of this global system. These imperialist powers dominate the oppressed nations—where over 80 percent of the world's people live—economically, politically, and militarily. The imperialists set the terms for what will be produced in these countries—not to meet the needs of their peoples, but to further the interests of the imperialists, in particular their profitable accumulation of capital.

Imperialist investment is not—as we're told by the capitalist media—a "boon" or a "handout" for people in oppressed countries. As Raymond Lotta has written, "the economic structure of the oppressed nations (like India) is shaped mainly by forces external to them: what is produced, exported and imported, financed, etc., reflects first and foremost their subordination, and not principally the internal requirements and interrelations of different sectors. They answer to another's 'heartbeat.'"4

Globalization, including Third World countries becoming further integrated into and subordinated to imperialism, has intensified since the end of World War 2. Imperialism's need to further integrate and subordinate Third World countries like India took a leap following the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union—which by the mid-1950s was an imperialist, not a socialist, country. Suddenly, the global political, economic, and military landscape was radically changed. The U.S. and Western imperialist powers had triumphed in the Cold War. The U.S. saw the need and the opportunity to accelerate capitalist "globalization": to break down barriers to global investment, exploitation, and trade, including opening up countries formerly allied with the Soviet Union or formerly closed to the West.

Poor countries around the world, in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, have been subjected to Structural Adjustment Programs imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. These programs require that Third World governments meet strict conditions to get new loans or to obtain lower interest rates on existing loans. Both the IMF and World Bank are controlled by the imperialist powers, especially the United States. And this restructuring creates more favorable conditions for imperialist trade and investment.5

Imperialist restructuring has led to enormous changes in agricultural production in the oppressed countries. They have been more deeply integrated into the workings of an imperialist‑dominated global food system. Agriculture has been further "industrialized" and reshaped to better serve the imperialists. Traditional subsistence farming (based on producing staples like corn, beans, etc.) has more and more been overrun and swallowed up by imperialist‑controlled agribusiness.

India, the world's second most populous country, was one of the U.S.'s prime targets and has been ground zero for this agricultural restructuring. India was a longtime ally of the Soviet Union, and most of its economy was controlled and directed by the Indian state, which represented the interests of Indian capitalism and landed property, including semi-feudal landlordism.
Capitalist Globalization's Devastating Impact on India's Agriculture

India remains a predominantly agrarian society, with over 800 million people (of the 1.2 billion total population)—nearly 70 percent of the population—living in rural areas. Over half of India's workforce of nearly 500 million works in agriculture.6

The world's capitalist powers say that poor countries being integrated into the world imperialist system will lead to rapid economic growth and development and rising standards of living for all. When President Obama addressed India's Parliament in November 2010, he praised India for not "resisting the global economy," instead becoming "one of its engines." He claimed this had unleashed "an economic marvel that has lifted tens of millions from poverty and created one of the world's largest middle classes," and that advanced technology was now "empowering farmers and women" in India.7

But what globalization has actually meant for the masses of people in India is intensified exploitation, sweatshops, and growing disparity between the rich and poor. After 25 years of market reform, the average calorie intake in India has declined! And globalization has meant the ruin of many farmers, driving them into desperation. Let's look, for example, at how imperialist globalization has affected cotton farmers in India, who are a lot of the farmers committing suicide.
Compete on the Global Market... Or Go Under

Beginning in the 1990s, the U.S., the World Bank, and the IMF pressured India to privatize many of its state-owned enterprises, slash regulations on business, cut spending on social services and subsidies to small farmers, tear down barriers to foreign investment and trade, and integrate its economy, including agriculture, more closely into the imperialist-dominated global capitalist order.

Under this "neo-liberal" program, the Indian government reduced subsidies and access to credit for farmers, who had mainly been raising food crops for domestic consumption. It pushed farmers to switch from foodstuffs to cash crops for sale on the global market. And as part of this, the Indian state has promoted the expansion of cotton growing. Today there are 4 million cotton farmers in India, which is now the world's second largest cotton producer.8

However, to sell their cotton, Indian farmers now faced the volatile ups and downs of the global market, and competition with giant multi-national corporations based in the imperialist countries, which had enormous advantages in technology, marketing, and financial resources.

The report, "Every 30 Minutes" says, "In order to compete on the global market, then, Indian cotton farmers desperately turned to using new, higher-priced inputs," and "the cotton market has become increasingly commercialized, and is dominated by a small group of multinational corporations that exert increasing control over the cost, quality, and availability of agricultural inputs."

In India, giant imperialist monopolies exerted this control and extracted huge profits through the sale of genetically modified cottonseed, especially Bollgard Bt cottonseed, made by the U.S. chemical giant Monsanto, the world's largest seed producer.

When Bt cottonseed was approved by the Indian state in 2002, Monsanto launched an aggressive sales program in India with salesmen going from village to village promising these seeds would yield higher outputs—and income—including because they're resistant to some pests, so less can be spent on pesticides. By 2009, a majority of India's cotton farmers invested in the seed, and 85 percent of cotton produced in India was Bt cotton.9
"They Consume the Very Pesticide That They Purchased, in Order to Kill Themselves"

Farmer Shende shouldered at least four debts at the time of his death: one from a bank, two procured on his behalf by his sisters and one from a local moneylender. The night before his suicide, he borrowed one last time. From a fellow villager, he took the equivalent of $9, roughly the cost of a one-liter bottle of pesticide, which he used to take his life.10

Bt cottonseeds cost from two to 10 times as much as regular cottonseed, and can end up accounting for 50 percent of farming costs. Making matters worse, farmers are often prevented from reusing these genetically modified Bt seeds without paying a fee each year to Monsanto—which owns the "intellectual property rights" to the seed.11

Of the 89.35 million farmer households in India, small and marginal farmers make up 84 percent of all agricultural land holdings. These small farmers on average earn less than $2 per day, according to a 2003 study.12

And the workings of imperialism have increasingly forced these kinds of farmers into debt, squeezing them from two sides. On the one hand, these farmers have to pay more for seed, fertilizers, etc., so their costs have gone up. On the other hand, in the name of neo-liberal reform, the government has cut back in providing low-cost credit to small farmers while credit is channeled towards the largest, most profitable agricultural enterprises. This has meant that farmers have had to seek out sources of credit from local, predatory money lenders. And they end up going ever deeper into debt and desperation.

While growing Bt cotton for the global capitalist market can produce high returns, it is also highly precarious and unpredictable. Prices can swing sharply on the world market. Today the price of cotton in real terms is one-twelfth what it was 30 years ago. Also, Bt cotton requires a larger and steadier flow of water than traditional seed, yet 65 percent of cotton farmers have no access to irrigation and depend on monsoon rains. (Only 37 percent of rural households in India have electricity, and 80,000 villages are not even connected to the grid.13) Less than an average rainfall can wipe out their crop, and India's rainfall and weather patterns have become increasingly irregular, with annual monsoons failing three times in the last 10 years and drought impacting some provinces. These changes may be connected to global warming.14

Meanwhile, competition from cotton imported from the U.S. and other major capitalist countries—where farmers and agricultural corporations have much greater access to capital and advanced technology—is driving down cotton prices and ruining tens of thousands of Indian farmers.

Between 1997 and 2004, India imported some eight million bales of American cotton. This cotton was being sold at a price 50 to 65 percent lower than the cost of production because it was being subsidized by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which spent $245.2 billion to subsidize U.S. cotton farmers from 1995 to 2009, as part of promoting the interests of U.S. capital around the world.15

Smita Narula, co-author of "Every Thirty Minutes," sums up the impact of all this on tens of thousands of India's farmers: "So they've gone into insurmountable debt to purchase the inputs. They don't have the yields. They repeat this cycle for a couple of seasons. And by the end of it, they're simply trapped in a cycle that they can't get out of, and they consume the very pesticide that they purchased, in order to kill themselves."16
India's Agrarian Crisis

The plight of Indian cotton farmers is part of a broader crisis in Indian agriculture, and most farmers facing ruin have no place to turn. India's much-talked about information technology and business processing industries—the so‑called new economy—employ only 1.3 million out of India's working population of nearly 500 million.17

Oppressive traditional feudal and patriarchal relations also weigh heavily on Indian farmers. Those with daughters have to pay dowries to a prospective husband's family in order for them to be married:

"Farmers who pay these dowries fall further into debt—or face the social stigma of being unable to pay—and may commit suicide as a result. Even more startlingly, in Andhra Pradesh, unmarried daughters, wracked with guilt over their fathers' deaths, have committed suicide themselves. Finally, when husbands commit suicide, they not only leave their wives with their debt but also with the responsibility to marry off their daughters. As farmer-activist Sunanda Jayaram has noted, ‘There are debts hanging on [women's] heads which they did not incur. There are daughters whose marriages are pending. The pressure is unending.'"18

Indian farmers can no longer count on their own food production to stave off hunger and are increasingly subject to the global food crisis created by imperialism. The Revolution article, "The Global Food Crisis...and the Ravenous System of Capitalism" points out:

"Third World countries have been forced to shift much of their food production away from subsistence crops to high value exports. They have been pressured to open up their markets to cheap food imports. As a result, local food production for domestic consumption has been undercut. Now these countries are caught in a vise: The price of imported food has gone way up at the same time that the ability to produce food for local consumption has been eroded."19

In an article about the food crisis in India, Utsa Patnaik wrote, "The colonized Indian peasant starved while exporting wheat to England, and the modern Indian peasant is eating less while growing gherkins and roses for rich consumers abroad." Today, one quarter of India's population—some 300 million people—does not have enough money to eat adequately.20
"The Largest Wave of Recorded Suicides in Human History"

Imperialism has everything to do with the epidemic of farmer suicides in India. And the United States, in particular, plays a major role in shaping India's murderous agricultural system. During her visit to the Indian Agricultural Research Institute in July 2009, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that agriculture would be the "strongest and most important pillar" of the strategic partnership between the U.S. and India.

What's taken place in India over the past 16 years represents, in the words of one Indian researcher, "the largest wave of recorded suicides in human history."21

What makes this such a towering crime is that it's totally unnecessary. There is no reason that agriculture and food and other needed goods can only be produced if a profit is turned and the interests of a handful of imperialist powers are served. The basis exists, in human knowledge, technology, and resources, to solve the needs—including for food and clothing—of humanity. But what stands in the way of this is a world economic system of capitalism driven by profit.

Unless and until this system is abolished through revolution, and is replaced by a new socialist system, there will continue to be massive hunger, starvation, dislocation—and yes, farmers will be driven to drink pesticide out of horrific desperation. Under socialism, making sure people have enough food will be the first priority in agricultural production and part of building a whole world of shared abundance for everybody.

India's epidemic of farmer suicides, and understanding that it has been spawned by the workings of the capitalist-imperialist system, speaks powerfully—and achingly—to the urgent need for the revolutions that can bring that better world into being.

http://revcom.us/a/236/imperialist_suicide_epidemic-en.html