World Watch: Gone Gbagbo gone

* Ivory Coast: Disgraced former president Laurent Gbagbo may face “judicial proceedings” after he was detained by French and opposition forces.

* Japan: No tsunami warning was issued after a 6.3-magnitude earthquake struck off the Japanese coast one month after a major tremor and tsunami killed an estimated 25,000 people.

* Belarus: President Alexander Lukashenko claimed that a deadly bombing in the Minsk metro on Monday might’ve been a “gift from abroad.”

* France: Two Muslim women were arrested for peacefully protesting France’s ban on wearing face veils in public.

Image – Str/AFP/Getty Images via The Guardian (“Former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo and his wife Simone after their arrest.”)
Online Sources- Busninessweek, USA TODAY, BBC News, The Guardian

Conviction upheld vs. FARC t-shirt makers

A Danish court upheld the conviction against six people convicted of selling clothes with profits destined to Colombia’s FARC guerillas.

An appeals court last September found that shirt company Fighters + Lovers was guilty of breaking Denmark’s antiterrorism laws by pledging to donate 75 cents from each sale of $33 shirts to the FARC and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Today’s Danish Supreme Court ruling concurred with that ruling which said that both groups are "terrorist organizations that have committed acts aimed at destabilizing a state or a government and have attacked civilian targets". (Indeed, the FARC and PFLP are considered terrorist organizations by the U.S. and E.U.)

The accused rejected the court’s claims and argued that their aim was to support "humanitarian projects" conducted by “legitimate resistance movements.” One of those convicted- Katrine Willumsen- tried to partially justify the FARC’s actions:

"A lot of the accusations [against Farc] are not true," she said. "But we are aware that Farc sometimes does stuff that is not OK. We do not believe that the Farc are angels, but they are not demons either. People must see the difference between terrorists and people fighting for freedom, and Danish law does not make that distinction."

Colombia continues to be submerged in a maelstrom of violence by the FARC and other rebels, rightist paramilitaries, and the Colombian state. Euphemisms cannot hide the suffering of millions of Colombians whose lives have been irreparably changed by forced exiles, massacres, and kidnappings. Rather than trying to help the FARC, Fighters + Lovers should assist the many legitimate Colombian groups and NGOs who have worked hard for meaningful social justice. The brave and peaceful actions of these groups have been hurt by Willumsen and her cohorts who have foolishly decided to help destructive rebels instead.

Image- Copenhagen Post
Online Sources- Guardian UK, The Latin Americanist, Al Jazeera English