April 4-5-6, 2008, Milan, Italy
first video spot advertising the forum has appeared

Sr. Ricardo Concha, Embajador de Chile en Dinamarca 26.10.2007
Sr. Ovid Harasich, Embajador de Chile en Suecia
Sr. Carlos Parra Merino, Embajador de Chile en Finlandia

LIBERTAD Y JUSTICIA PARA PRESOS POLITICOS MAPUCHE.

En Abril 2006 junto a el ex-candidato presidencial Tomás Hirsch, en su visita a Escandinavia, al Comite de Juntos Podemos de Estocolmo con muchas otras asociaciones de inmigrantes chilenos, organizamos una protesta masiva por el maltrato al pueblo Mapuche. Entregamos personalmente una carta al Sr, Embajador Chileno en Estocolmo junto a una delegación de miembros de la Internacional Humanista de España, Italia, Dinamarca, Finlandia y Chile,

Nuestra protesta en Abril 2006 tenía como sujeto la situación de los presos políticos Mapuches, quienes estaban en huelga de hambre. Pedíamos la liberación inmediata de los presos políticos.

Parece que nuestra protesta no ha sido para nada efectiva. Entonces hoy estaremos de nuevo poniendo atención a la misma cosa: El maltrato de los indígenas de Chile por un gobierno que se dice progresista o socialista y la negación de sus demandas legitimas. La situación es la misma que antes: No se los quiere considerar presos políticos que es lo que realmente son. Se los encarcela, hacen huelgas de hambre y se todavía creen en Chile que esto se puede silenciar, sin entender que la comunidad internacional esta totalmente conciente de crimen a los DDHH. Ellos son escuchados. Numerosas y prestigiosas organizaciones internacionales de derechos humanos los escuchan . Son escuchados de gente buena de todos latitudes. Pero no son escuchados por el Gobierno de Chile.

Por este razón aquí en Dinamarca nos unimos a la Jornada de Solidaridad Internacional en apoyo a las demandas de los prisioneros políticos Mapuches en huelga de hambre recluidos en las cárceles Chilenas.

Juha Uski
Representante de Internacional Humanista* en Finlandia
Residente de Dinamarca

Como representante en Dinamarca me sumo a este denuncia por los DDHH en Chile.

Lars Kramer Kristensen
Representante de Internacional Humanista en Dinamarca

Estocolmo, Abril 2006: Claudio Miconi de Italia, Tomás Hirsch de Chile, Rafael de la Rubia de España, Juha Uski de Finlandia.

Internacional Humanista
www.humanist-international.org
*) La Internacional Humanista es un organismo de coordinación entre todos los partidos políticos adherentes al Nuevo Humanismo. La Internacional tendrá la función de recoger y distribuir información entre los partidos miembros; de difundir las ideas y acción del Nuevo Humanismo y de promover la solidaridad internacional entre las naciones que luchan por su liberación política, económica y social.

Basics about violence.

Usual belief is that violence is natural. Whatever we want to do, we need to use power. Even if we are vegetarians, we will either destroy plants for our food, or die. To live in the world we need to use power.

Use of power, use of force is not the same as violence. Violence is defined as “excessive use of force”.

I need to eat. I use my powers to eat. but then I may want things that I don’t need. That means I don’t seek what I need but I seek something which I have become obsessive about. When I am obsessed by my desire, I become blind.

Your food is nicer than mine, your house is nicer than mine, I want them. I don’t see you, I see your food, your house. Or if it is mine already, I see my house, and you stay outside. I don’t see you, I see my own prejudices based on what I want to see. You are outside and it is justified by some clever excuse. I don’t see you, I see economics, culture, religion, politics, but I don’t see you because I see just systems that I can use to get what I want.

These systems become different forms of violence, of excessive use of force, excessive because they are based on what their builders want but do not need. I don’t mean that everything in economy, culture, religion and politics is unnecessary, but most of it is. Actually even worse: it is not liberating people but it is making people into slaves. There are different forms of violence and we can talk about them in many ways, for example:

Physical violence. With or without weapons.

Economic violence. Exploitation, and in general denial of the economic needs of others.

Religious and racist violence. Dogmatism, discrimination of different people.

Moral violence. Someone who sees the needs of others being denied, and does not do anything to stop the violence.

Psychological violence. Threats of other forms of violence.

Responses to violence are three kinds: 1. externalization 2. internalization 3. overcoming.

Externalization means that one tries to get rid of the violence by seeing it as separate from oneself. The violator is demonized. Fight against the demon means retaliation and resentment. But carrying resentment is a heavy load. So externalization fails and violence is internalized as resentment.

Internalization means that one tries to integrate the experience of violence through accepting it entirely as something inevitable. Feelings of resentment are not resolved, instead they are suppressed because of fear. One tries to forget the existence of violence and escape into fantasies of moral supremacy, from where one pretends to forgive the violator.

Overcoming violence is not possible through retaliation, resentment, forgetting or forgiving. Overcoming violence can be done through reconciliation. Reconciliation means, to recognise the situation and the mistakes that have been done, trying to understand them and to create a new direction to the situation, direction towards harmony.

Reconciliation starts with oneself, through recognising ones own mistakes sincerely. The recognition of ones own mistakes leads one to wish to change oneself and to repair twice over the damage done to others, regardless whether those others are violent or not.

This reconciliation is a free act from oneself, and it is a creation of a different channel of communication with others, also those who have hurt oneself. From there starts the work of active non-violence. Active non-violence means to persuade the violator to stop the excessive use of force, so that harmony can take place. The energy of the resentment is not suppressed but instead intentionally transformed into a struggle for profound transformation that eliminates the pattern of violence entirely.

Persuasion means first of all to let violators see the harmfulness of their actions. This is the basis for denouncements, protests and demonstrations, which denounce the excessive uses of force and which may also use humour to ridicule the actions of the violator and thus give a different point of view both to the oppressor and the oppressed. On the other hand demonstrations and events like street parties can be demonstrations of a more constructive use of force, giving an image and experience of liberation.

If simple protests continuously fail, the more extreme step of active non-violence is non-cooperation. This means to boycott, create silence, ignore, withdraw all cooperation with the violator, the form of violence, the institution which perpetuates a form of violence. As this is a form of persuasion, the violator may be informed of the terms that have to be met in order for cooperation to take place again. Strikes at workplaces are a typical case.

If non-cooperation has no effect, the next possible course of action is non-violent intervention. Interventions are disruptions or destruction of established forms of violence – established, imposed orders. Intervention can mean occupations, blockades, fasting, overloading facilities, sabotage. To be non-violent, interventions need to follow the code of civil disobedience, which means that direct harm to persons is avoided and violence is not responded to with violence. This will mean for example not resisting arrest.

Non-cooperation and intervention methods can be most meaningful and successful, if at the same time a constructive program is developed. This means to construct non-violent ways and forms of social life and to further the openness and the depth of dialogue with oneself and with others. This is, of course, difficult when under the influence of violence, and non-violence cannot count on being successful but instead one should be prepared to fail many times. The meaningfulness of non-violent action is not tied to its immediate results but on the internal sensation of the person doing it: it feels as an act of internal unity. Such an act has three characteristics: 1. one feels in agreement with oneself when doing it. 2. One feels that the act continues in time, it does not end in itself. 3. one feels that doing so, one grows as a person, becomes better, experiences inner growth.

Prague, 10.20.2007

Bolivian President Evo Morales, Ken Livingstone, mayor of London and Hiroshima mayor, Tadatoshi Akiba, sent messages of support to the first International Meeting Against New US Military Bases in the Czech Republic. The meeting was organized by the Europe and No Bases movement.

The mayor of Brdy, in attendance together with another 80 mayors, thanked the participation of the 13 European Humanist Party delegations and enforced his commitment with the permanent outcry against the proliferation of nulcear weapons in the continent. The main representatives of campaigns for nuclear disarmament participated such as Kate Hudson, (CND), and Bruce Gagnon (Global Networks against Weapons and and Nuclear Power in Space).

Spokesperson of New Humanism in Europe, Giorgio Schultze, demanded, “the removal of all nuclear weapons in US and NATO military bases, the dismantling and elimination of arsenals in France and Great Britain, as the first steps for global nuclear disarmament under UN supervision.”

Participants were invited to the next events which will take place in the months to come: International Forum for Nuclear Disarmament in Madrid in November, Nonviolence Forum in Paris (December) and European Humanist Forum in Milan in April 2008.

High resolution pictures:
www.nezakladnam.cz/press/20071020/P1110624.JPG
www.nezakladnam.cz/press/20071020/P1110868.JPG
www.nezakladnam.cz/press/20071020/P1110914.JPG
www.nezakladnam.cz/press/20071020/P1110924.JPG
www.nezakladnam.cz/press/20071020/P1120884.JPG

Further information:
www.europeforpeace.eu
www.giorgioschultze.eu

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