All posts by nedhamson

Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

Opinion: Children of the World – We are Standing Watch for You | Inter Press Service

We must also continue to raise our voices in the face of tremendous opposition from groups that continue to oppose the treaty, arguing that it infringes upon national sovereignty. Quite the opposite is true: no sane definition of national sovereignty includes the right to sell arms for the violation of human rights in other countries. A nation willing to carry out such an act is not defending itself, but rather infringing upon the sovereignty of other nations that only want to live in peace.

We must also avoid using the danger and terrorism in the world today as an excuse for lack of regulation. Cicero’s famous phrase “silent enimleges inter armas” – among arms, laws are silent – has often been used to support the mind-set that the law does not apply during times of war.

But it is at times of war that the law must speak most bravely. When weapons are circulating freely into the worst possible hands, the law must speak. When the lives of the innocent are placed in danger by an absence of regulation, the law must speak.

via Opinion: Children of the World – We are Standing Watch for You | Inter Press Service.

“We’re fighting her lung cancer right now. She’s lost so much…

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“We’re fighting her lung cancer right now. She’s lost so much weight. We just moved to the sea so the air would be better. We had a close call the other night. I sleep in a different room because I don’t want to wake her with my snoring. But I woke up in the middle of the night and I could feel that something was wrong. I saw her shadow on the wall. I ran out to meet her in the hall, and she was gasping for her last breath. I had to give her an injection in the chest. If I hadn’t seen her shadow, we’d have lost her. Three years ago, the doctors told us that she only had six months. But God has given us three years. We take walks. We play backgammon. We look at photos of the grandchildren. I’m trying to cherish every moment.”

(Namakabroud, Iran)

via “We’re fighting her lung cancer right now. She’s lost so much….

Former Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui refers to Japan as ‘the motherland,’ infuriates both sides of the strait

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Taiwan’s former President Lee Teng-hui is facing criticism from all sides after a recent interview in which he called Japan “the motherland” and dismissed the current Taiwanese administration’s efforts to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II as nothing more than an attempt to “curry favor [with mainland] China.”

What happened on Saturday the 22nd of August

Hummus For Thought

This is a personal account of what happened yesterday night, Saturday the 22nd of August 2015. I was there alongside thousands of Lebanese citizens demanding for our rights when we were met with police brutality, teargas canisters, water-canons and armed thugs following peaceful protestors and beating them. As with the previous post, I’m responsible for my own words.

As one of those who helped organize this protest, I can safely tell you that the government’s reaction was beyond anything we were expecting. We were expecting water-cannons like last time, and many of us came prepared for those (putting our phones in plastic bags etc.). But we were not prepared for the teargas and we were certainly not expecting to see riot police and army men playing the role of government thugs.

The sheer savagery of riot police and army men shooting teargas canisters haphazardly at any concentration of people they…

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When We Protested and The Lebanese Government Tried To Kill Us

A Separate State of Mind | A Blog by Elie Fares

At 6:00PM on August 22nd, 2015, around 10,000 Lebanese people gathered in Downtown Beirut to protest the country’s overwhelming garbage crisis and with it the corrupt political system that has allowed it to prosper unresolved over the past month, as it has allowed the country to disintegrate since its moment of inception.

I daresay it was the first time a Lebanese crowd gathered this substantially to protest in an apolitical way against a political system that’s affecting everyone. It was beautiful:

All pictures are taken by me unless noted otherwise. All pictures are taken by me unless noted otherwise.

The crowd was immensely creative. They carried Lebanese flags devoid of the Cedar, a bunch of hilarious posters, and even Batman was there:

The people at the protest had one goal in mind: to tell anyone who’d hear us exactly how horrifying our political system has become, to the point where we’re drowning in garbage and no one cares. To the…

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