I'm going to close out the Acceptance/Rejection O'Meter for
8/01-8/02 and start a new one for 9/02-9/03. I've been torn
about whether or not to mention the new major change in my
life because I don't intend for this to be a personal space.
A lot of people view the KIS.list as a diary, while I don't
view it that way at all. The conversations I have here are
intimate, but they are not about my personal life, they are
about my writing life and sometimes about traveling and other
art forms. I'm not interested in turning this into a personal
space, but in reference to the rate at which I will be submitting
work in the future and the regularity of the KIS.list in its
second year, I will say that I am becoming a mother this month.
Due to this life change, I am not sure how rigorous I will
be able to be, especially during the first few months, about
maintaining the list. I will certainly be submitting less
work for publication, and will probably be a bit more erratic
with the KIS.list. The list will continue, though I am not
sure exactly when it will resume and with what frequency.
No acceptances or rejections this month.
Kiini's Rate of Acceptance/Rejection for August 2001 - August
2002
Publications: Acceptances = 6; Rejections = 6
Grants/Fellowships: Acceptances = 0; Rejections = 1
Residencies/Workshops: Acceptances = 0; Rejections = 4
I was talking to my father recently about a video program
he teaches to New Orleans public high school students. One
of the program's administrators had to relocate at the last
minute, so my father stepped in as administrator. I asked
him how administrating was going and he said it was fine,
but it definitely took away from his teaching. Whereas before
he was constantly thinking about the teaching component of
the program, now his mind is occupied with paperwork and scheduling
and other administrative matters. Suddenly it became clear
to me that the word "administration" is a perfect
word to encapsulate all that we adults have to do to survive
in the world. And the concept of the administrative position
pulling away from my father's focus on teaching is the perfect
example of the tension between art and survival.
I was walking to work recently with a graphic designer and
we were, as usual discussing the burden of 9-5. He had been
a freelancer in the past, and he said he feels the tragedy
of a full-time position is that it sucks all the adventure
and enjoyment of life. It diminishes the opportunity to ask
"what am I going to do today?" We talked about what
would be an ideal balance between work and play. He said he
thought three days a week was good. That gave him three days
to handle the workplace‹financial administration‹and
enough off time to handle housework‹personal administration,
and still have enough mental space and empty moments in which
to maintain a sense of wonder and surprise in life. As we
go about working our jobs, building our careers, acquiring
homes and cars, there is an important question to ask: how
do I want to spend my days? What is my ideal balance of administration
and play? What possessions, obligations or lifestyle choices
do I have to alter or obliterate to free me up to make better
administrative choices?
A writer friend wrote in to our writing group complaining
about her job. "I hate my job, I want to quit,"
she wrote. "What do I do?" She got a very detailed
response from one of the group members who had recently quit
her job and is currently in grad school. In addition to suggesting
exactly how the writer could plan to quit her job, the group
member made specific suggestions for how the writer could
go about improving her job in the meantime. One of the group
member's suggestions was not taking on extra obligations.
When she examined her schedule, the writer discovered that
she was on approximately 8 committees, advisor to another
and volunteered with a choir. "Maybe you don't hate your
job," someone else in the group wrote in. "Maybe
you hate all your extracurricular activities."
So often, we are not even aware of the real culprits eating
our time and pulling us away from our play/art. The writer
soon wrote in to say she quit four committees and the choir,
and in the process remembered a few more extracurricular activities
she was involved in. Freeing yourself from superfluous activities
not only liberates time, but it frees up valuable headspace.
Mental clutter can be just as limiting as no time. Art/play
demands a balance of energy and attention.
I remember talking to a family friend about my ideal idea.
At the time it was eating breakfast, writing for three or
four hours, having lunch with friends, returning home to paint,
then hanging out for dinner and evening activities. She said
she had never thought about how she would ideally like to
spend her days. When she did start creating her perfect day,
she instantly realized she'd have to disappear a certain chunk
of debt to be free enough to make less money and spend her
time as she pleases. In other words, she instantly realized
the need to adjust her administrative weight to deepen her
space/opportunity for play.
When I think about it, I think this whole administration
vs. play tension can be used to evaluate all types of relationships.
Most certainly, the relationship between the artist and art,
but also in personal relationships as well. The relationship
of a homeowner and a home. In any relationship, if you are
spending more time administrating‹negotiating, fighting,
struggling, fixing, altering‹than you are simply enjoying
the presence of that person or object in your life, then something's
out of whack. Certainly every relationship requires some administration,
but what is the perfect amount. How much of your energy are
you willing to spend administrating? This is the constant
question of the artist, and I dare say, this is one of the
central questions each person has to resolve in life itself.
Be well. Be love(d).
Kiini Ibura Salaam
=======FOR=========THE========RECORD=========
As I was reading COLONIZE THIS! the book of women of color
on today's feminism in which I was recently anthologized,
I noticed the number of times THIS BRIDEGE CALLED MY BACK
was mentioned. While I remember the book's title and may even
have flipped through it, I don't remember reading it. But
what the many references to the title assured me, this book
was groundbreaking not only for feminism or for women of color,
but in the transformation or sustenance of personal lives.
A follow up book - THIS BRIDGE WE CALL HOME - is soon to be
released and there is a gathering to celebrate this release,
see below.
Dear Friends:
The anthology This Bridge Called My Back edited by Cherrie
Moraga and Gloria Anzaldua opened doors, influenced movements,
and inspired thousands of people in activist, feminist, academic,
and artistic worlds.
The new book to be released in September 2002, This Bridge
We Call Home: Radical Visions for Transformation edited by
AnaLouise Keating and Gloria Anzaldua, examines the impact
of radical feminist of color visions on a generation. Join
us to reflect upon and to celebrate the legacy of radical
women of color in a multi-genre event on Saturday, October
26. From 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. we will gather at the Audre Lorde
Project in Fort Greene, Brooklyn for reflections, readings,
artwork, and performances.
Join Cheryl Clarke, Mirtha Quintanales, Daisy Hernandez, Bushra
Rehman, Nathalie Handal, Chitra Ganesh, Imani Uzuri, Sarah
Husain, David Sparks and other performers, writers, and artists.
Please spread the word, and bring your friends and family.
We hope to see you on October 26.
ALSO:
U.S. MEDIA BLACKOUT (long)
By Kate Randall
Massacre in Mazar, a documentary by Irish director Jamie Doran,
was screened last week beforeselect audiences in Europe. The
film documents events following the
November 21, 2001 fall of Konduz, the Taliban's last stronghold
in northern Afghanistan. [See: Afghan war documentary charges
US with mass killings ]
The film presents powerful testimony from Afghan witnesses
that US troops collaborated in the torture and killings of
thousands of Taliban prisoners near Mazar-i-Sharif. The film,
which has prompted demands for an international commission
of inquiry on war crimes in Afghanistan, received widespread
coverage in the European press, with major stories in the
Guardian, Le Monde, Suddeutsche Zeitung, Die Welt and other
papers.
This major story, however, has received virtually no coverage
in US newspapers or on network or cable television. Aside
from stories on some alternative Internet publications, and
a June 16 article on Salon.com, the story has been essentially
blacked out in the US.
An Afghan man lifts the head of a child who along with 11
other civilians died during US air raids in Kabul on October
28, 2001, witnesses said a man and his seven children were
killed when a bomb crashed through their home. (AP photo)
More photos
A search for news about the documentary in the major dailies
including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los
Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe and the
Miami Herald turned up empty. Web sites for ABC, NBC, CBS,
Fox News and CNN have likewise carried nothing on the film.
Repeated telephone calls by the WSWS to these news sources,
inquiring why they have failed to cover the story, went unanswered.
How is possible that not a single major US media outlet chose
to cover such an important news event? There is no innocent
or journalistic explanation.
This wholesale political censorship cannot be justified on
the basis that Massacre in Mazar or the events it depicts
are not newsworthy. The two screenings of the documentary
in Germany prompted calls by a number of European parliamentary
deputies and human rights advocates for an independent investigation
into the atrocities exposed by the film. Calling for an inquiry,
prominent human rights lawyer Andrew McEntee commented it
was clear there is prima facie evidence of serious war crimes
committed not just under international law, but also under
the laws of the United States itself.
The film includes scenes of the aftermath of the massacre
of hundreds of Taliban fighters who were taken prisoner outside
Mazar-i-Sharif, at the Qala-i-Jangi prison, showing captured
troops who were apparently shot with their hands tied. The
filmmaker also interviewed eyewitnesses, who describe the
torture and slaughter of 3,000 prisoners, who were allegedly
driven to a desert area and massacred. These witnesses who
were not paid have offered to provide testimony before any
independent investigation into the events.
The film footage is so damning that both the Pentagon and
the US State Department were compelled within days to issued
statements denying the allegations of US complicity in the
torture and murder of POWs, which are powerfully pointed to
by the film. If the US government is so concerned over the
implications of what the documentary exposes, why has the
US media chosen not to report on it?
Since September 11, this same print and broadcast media has
consistently toed the Bush administration s propaganda line;
and there has been no shortage of coverage on the Afghan war.
The government s flouting of international law and the Geneva
Conventions in the treatment of Afghan war prisoners at the
Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba and proposals for secret
military tribunals have gone virtually unchallenged. Assaults
on the democratic rights of both immigrants and citizens including
secret detentions and suppression of protests have been reported
as legitimate aspects of the government s war on terrorism.
One topic that has received short shrift in the American press
is the civilian death toll in the US air raids in Afghanistan,
which human rights advocates estimate at more than 3,500,
not including the thousands facing death from starvation and
displacement.
The well-known motto of the New York Times, All the news that's
fit to print, increasingly masks a practice by that newspaper
and all the media of choosing to print only that which fits
the war propaganda needs of the Pentagon and the White House.
The refusal of the press to report on the charges of US complicity
in the torture and mass killings in Afghanistan shown in Massacre
in Mazar or even to acknowledge the existence of the film
serves one purpose: to keep the American people in the dark
about the Bush administration's military actions and human
rights violations.
The media's silence makes it complicit in what are horrific
war crimes. It also provides an even more sinister service
to the Bush administration. Filmmaker Jamie Doran decided
to release a rough cut of his documentary before final editing
because he feared Afghan forces were preparing to destroy
evidence of the mass killings, scattering the remains of the
victims. Self-censorship by the US media only facilitates
such a grisly cover-up.
Afghan war documentary charges US with mass killings
of POWs
Showings in Europe spark demands for war crimes probe
By Stefan Steinberg
17 June 2002
A documentary film, Massacre in Mazar, by Irish director Jamie
Doran, was shown to selected audiences in Europe last week,
provoking demands for an international inquiry into US war
crimes in Afghanistan.
The film alleges that American troops collaborated in the
torture of POWs and the killing of thousands of captured Taliban
soldiers near the town of Mazar-i-Sharif. It documents events
following the November 21, 2001 fall of Konduz, the Taliban
s last stronghold in northern Afghanistan.
The film was shown in Berlin by the PDS (Party of Democratic
Socialism) parliamentary fraction to members of the German
parliament on June 12. The following day it was shown to deputies
and members of the press at the European parliament in Strasbourg.
After seeing the film, French Euro MP Francis Wurtz, a member
of the United Left fraction that organised the showing, said
he would call for an urgent debate on the issues raised in
the film at the next session of the European parliament in
July. A number of other deputies in the European parliament
called on the International Committee of the Red Cross to
carry out an independent investigation into the allegations
raised in the film.
Leading international human rights lawyer Andrew McEntee,
who was present at the special screening in Berlin, said it
was clear there is prima facie evidence of serious war crimes
committed not just under international law, but also under
the laws of the United States itself.
McEntee called for an independent investigation. No functioning
criminal justice system can choose to ignore this evidence,
he said.
The Pentagon issued a statement June 13 denying the allegations
of US complicity in the torture and murder of POWs, and the
US State Department followed suit with a formal denial on
June 14.
Doran, an award-winning independent filmmaker, whose documentaries
have been seen in over 35 countries, said he decided to release
a rough cut of his account of war crimes because he feared
Afghan forces were about to cover up the evidence of mass
killings. It s absolutely essential that the site of the mass
grave is protected, Doran told United Press International
after the screening in Strasbourg. Otherwise the evidence
will disappear.
Doran's call for the preservation of evidence was echoed by
the Boston- based Physicians for Human Rights, which issued
a statement June 14 urging that immediate steps be taken to
safeguard the gravesite of the alleged victims near Mazar-i-Sharif.
Late last year Doran shot footage of the aftermath of the
massacre of hundreds of captured Taliban troops at the Qala-i-Janghi
prison fortress outside of Mazar-i-Sharif. His film clips,
showing prisoners who had apparently been shot with their
hands tied, ignited an international outcry over the conduct
of American special operations forces and their Northern Alliance
allies.
Doran s new film includes interviews with eyewitnesses to
torture and the slaughter of some 3,000 POWs. It also contains
footage of the desert scene where the alleged massacre took
place. Skulls, clothing and limbs still protrude from the
mound of sand, more than six months after the event.
The film has received widespread coverage in the European
press, with articles featured in some of the main French and
German newspapers (Le Monde, Suddeutsche Zeitung, Die Welt).
Jamie Doran has also given interviews to two of the main German
television companies.
While the documentary has become a major news story in Europe,
it has been virtually blacked out by the American media. The
UPI released a dispatch on the screenings last week, yet the
existence of the film has not even been reported by such leading
newspapers as the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and
the Washington Post. The film and its allegations of US war
crimes have been similarly suppressed by the television networks
and cable news channels.
This reporter was able to view the 20-minute-long documentary
in Berlin. In the course of the film a series of witnesses
appear and testify that American military forces participated
in the armed assault and killing of several hundred Taliban
prisoners in the Qala-i-Janghi fortress. Witnesses also allege
that, following the events at Qala-i-Janghi, the American
army command was complicit in the killing and disposal of
a further 3,000 prisoners, out of a total of 8,000 who surrendered
after the battle of Konduz.
Afghan witnesses who speak of these atrocities are not identified
by name, but, according to the director, all those testifying
in the film are willing to give their names and appear before
an international tribunal to investigate the events of the
end of last November and beginning of December.
In Doran s film, Amir Jahn, an ally of Northern Alliance leader
General Rashid Dostum, states that the Islamic soldiers who
surrendered at Konduz did so only on the condition that their
lives would be spared. Some 470 captives were incarcerated
in Qala-i-Janghi. The remaining 7,500 were sent to another
prison at Kala-i-Zein.
Following a revolt by a number of the prisoners in Qala-i-Janghi,
the fortress was subjected to a massive barrage from the air
as well as the ground by American troops. The atrocities inside
Qala-i-Janghi are confirmed in the film by the head of the
regional Red Cross, Simon Brookes, who visited the fort shortly
after the massacre. He investigated the area and found bodies,
many with their faces twisted in agony.
The American Taliban supporter John Walker Lindh was one of
86 Taliban fighters who were able to survive the massacre
by hiding in tunnels beneath the fort . In one chilling scene
in the film, we witness actual footage, secretly shot, of
the interrogation of Lindh. We see him kneeling in the desert,
in front of a long row of captive Afghans, being interrogated
by two CIA officers. The officer leading the interrogation
is heard to say: But the problem is he needs to decide if
he lives or dies. If he does not want to die here, he is going
to die here, because we are going to leave him here and he
s going to stay in prison for the rest of his life.
Massacre in Mazar then goes to describe the treatment meted
out to the remaining thousands of captives who had surrendered
to the Northern Alliance and American troops. A further 3,000
prisoners were separated out from the total of 8,000 who had
surrendered, and were transported to a prison compound in
the town of Shibarghan.
They were shipped to Shibarghan in closed containers, lacking
any ventilation. Local Afghan truck drivers were commandeered
to transport between 200 and 300 prisoners in each container.
One of the drivers participating in the convoy relates that
an average of between 150 and 160 died in each container in
the course of the trip.
An Afghan soldier who accompanied the convoy said he was ordered
by an American commander to fire shots into the containers
to provide air, although he knew that he would certainly hit
those inside. An Afghan taxi driver reports seeing a number
of containers with blood streaming from their floors.
Another witness relates that many of the 3,000 prisoners were
not combatants, and some had been arrested by US soldiers
and their allies and added to the group for the mere crime
of speaking Pashto, a local dialect. Afghan soldiers testify
that upon arriving at the prison camp at Shibarghan, surviving
POWs were subjected to torture and a number were arbitrarily
killed by American troops.
One Afghan, shown in battle fatigues, says of the treatment
of prisoners in the Shibarghan camp: I was a witness when
an American soldier broke one prisoner s neck and poured acid
on others. The Americans did whatever they wanted. We had
no power to stop them.
Another Afghan soldier states, They cut off fingers, they
cut tongues, they cut their hair and cut their beards. Sometimes
they did it for pleasure; they took the prisoners outside
and beat them up and then returned them to the prison. But
sometimes they were never returned and they disappeared, the
prisoner disappeared. I was there.
Another Afghan witness alleges that, in order to avoid detection
by satellite cameras, American officers demanded the drivers
take their containers full of dead and living victims to a
spot in the desert and dump them. Two of the Afghan civilian
truck drivers confirm that they witnessed the dumping of an
estimated 3,000 prisoners in the desert.
According to one of the drivers, while 30 to 40 American soldiers
stood by, those prisoners still living were shot and left
in the desert to be eaten by dogs. The final harrowing scenes
of the film feature a panorama of bones, skulls and pieces
of clothing littering the desert.
See Also:
More evidence of US war crimes in Afghanistan: Taliban POWs
suffocated
inside cargo containers
[13 December 2001]
The Geneva Convention and the US massacre of POWs in Afghanistan
[7 December 2001]
After US massacre of Taliban POWs: the stench of death and
more media
lies
[29 November 2001]
US atrocity against Taliban POWs: Whatever happened to the
Geneva
Convention?
[28 November 2001]
US war crime in Afghanistan: Hundreds of prisoners of war
slaughtered at
Mazar-i-Sharif
[27 November 2001]
US war crime at Mazar-i-Sharif prison: new videotape evidence
[11 December 2001]
Thousands of POWs held in appalling conditions in Afghanistan
[8 January 2002]
Readers: The WSWS invites your comments. Please send e-mail.
Interview with Jamie Doran, director of Massacre at Mazar
By Stefan Steinberg
17 June 2002
Jamie Doran is an award-winning documentary filmmaker who
has been producing films for the past 22 years. He spent seven
years working for the BBC before establishing his own independent
television company. He has spent much of the last eight months
working in Afghanistan on film projects. The WSWS conducted
this interview with Doran on June 14.
WSWS: You deal briefly with the events in the fort of Qala-i-Janghi,
but the main part of your film concentrates on the fate of
all 8,000 fighters who surrendered to American forces in Konduz.
JD: That s right. 8,000 surrendered to Amir Jahn, who negotiated
the surrender deal. In the film he says he counted the prisoners
one by one, and there were 8,000 of them. 470 went to Qala-i-Janghi.
The assumption is that seven-and-a-half-thousand went from
Qala-i-Janghi to Sheberghan, and the result of that transport
was that, according to his words, Just 3,015 are left. Where
are the rest?
WSWS: What happened to the surviving 3,015? Have they been
set free?
JD: No, most of them are still there in prison. They are letting
some of them go, but the majority are still in detention.
WSWS: Regarding the US involvement in what took place, could
I ask about the witnesses who appear in the film?
JD: Three members of the Afghan military appear in the film,
two ordinary soldiers and one general. Then there is one taxi
diver who witnessed three containers with blood pouring from
them. He said his hair stood on end and that it was horrific.
Then two of the truck drivers testify who were forced to take
the containers into the desert. Based on the statements of
the witnesses, the total number of those transported was at
the very least 1,500, but more likely the total is up to 3,000.
WSWS: Is there any other evidence, apart from the testimony
of these witnesses, on the involvement of the American military
in the deaths of these 3,000 prisoners?
JD: Absolutely not. The reason the story has been released
early is that I received a warning from Mazar-i-Sharif that
the graves in the desert were being tampered with. All the
evidence is in the graves, and it is essential that those
graves are not touched!
WSWS: Do you know who was tampering with them?
JD: Yes I do, but I am not saying. What I am saying is that
everyone is innocent until proven guilty, and the genuinely
innocent have nothing to fear from an independent inquiry.
So the Afghans and Americans involved in this have nothing
to fear from an independent inquiry, if they are innocent.
I am sure they can have no objections to such an inquiry.
WSWS: In your opinion, in such an operation involving the
transportation and elimination of up to 3,000 people, is it
possible that the American troops did not have knowledge or
give their consent?
JD: You want my opinion? My answer is no. One hundred and
fifty Americans soldiers were present at Sheberghan prison.
That does not include CIA personnel. In my opinion, it would
be highly unlikely that they could remain unaware of something
taking place of such magnitude.
WSWS: In your opinion, how high up in the US army chain of
command does complicity in these events extend?
JD: I repeat. When you have 150 American soldiers and a number
of CIA personnel in the vicinity of Sheberghan prison, it
would be extremely strange if they did not have knowledge
of these atrocities taking place.
WSWS: In the film, witnesses say that American military personnel
were involved in the torture and shooting of Afghan prisoners.
JD: In the film, accusations are made that torture was carried
out by American soldiers, but the major accusation in terms
of the numbers involved is that an American officer told one
of the witnesses to get the containers out of the town of
Sheberghan before satellite pictures could be taken. Also,
one of the drivers talked of 30 to 40 American soldiers being
present at the location of the murder and burial of survivors
in the desert.
WSWS: Is there any evidence to point to the participation
of American soldiers in shooting victims in the desert?
JD: I have absolutely no evidence that American troops were
involved in the shooting that took place in the desert. At
the same time, there are other witnesses to the mass grave
in the desert. There are human rights activists who found
the mass grave in the desert even before me, and they now
describe my film as the missing link. They found the grave
and, under the auspices of the UN, dug up a small section
of earth containing 15 bodies. They estimate that in that
one section of the desert there were about a thousand bodies.
They too are calling for the grave to be protected, because
at the moment it is being protected by no one. So the evidence
can be easily tampered with.
WSWS: Based on the evidence of your film, what are you calling
for?
JD: I am a journalist. I do not make calls. What I am saying
is that evidence must be protected. It is essential that the
grave is protected until an international inquiry can be carried
out.
WSWS: What has been the reaction to your film?
JD: It has been incredible. I have had worldwide inquiries.
There has even been interest in America. It has been astonishing.
I have had inquires from South Africa, Australia, as well
as every country in Europe.
WSWS: What are your plans for showing the film to a wider
audience?
JD: As you know, this is a short film that I have released
in order to prevent the graves being damaged. The main film
will be finished in about five to six weeks, and will carry
greater implications against the people involved.
WSWS: Could you say something about the risks involved in
shooting your film?
JD: I was working as an independent journalist in Afghanistan
that says everything. I do not give a damn about my own position,
but I am concerned about my journalists there and, in particular,
I am concerned about the witnesses who risked everything to
appear in the film. They had no reason to give these interviews.
It has put them in great danger. None of them received a single
cent for their contributions. I repeat that they received
absolutely no payment for their appearance in the film and
have only, in fact, put themselves in extreme danger. It is
urgent that immediate action is taken to protect the graves,
protect the evidence. The innocent have nothing to fear.
See Also:
Afghan war documentary charges US with mass killings of POWs
Showings in Europe spark demands for war crimes probe
[17 June 2002]
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Readers: The WSWS invites your comments. Please send e-mail.