The Aberfan Young Wives Club

50 years ago next week on Friday October 21, 1966 , approx 9.16 a.m shortly after school assembly many tons of collier rubbish (slag heaps) swept down the sides of a  Merthyr Mountain  above the town of Aberfan after several days of heavy rain, Liquified and pouring down  this black tidal wave would engulf everything in its path in this catastrophic tragedy.A tragic memory from Wales's turbulent living history.
A new documentary will be examining how Aberfan has carried on in the 50 years since the horrifying events that took place on that day.The Aberfan Young Wives Club, to be broadcast on ITV tonight at 9pm on Wednesday, features the young women of the town who banded together to support each other and their community in the face of tragedy.
It follows the women who came together just weeks after so many mothers involved had buried their children to form a support group, which they dubbed the “Aberfan Young Wives Club”.The programme will focus on these women's vital role in keeping their community alive.
The group steadily grew in size and organised events, talks and trips, as well as helping each other in their bereavement. Some of the women will be speaking about their experience for the very first time.The film utilises remarkable archive footage as well as the moving testimony of the mothers who have met every week since the tragedy.
Aberfan was to many a result of a conflict of financial interests, which would see the death of 144 people, including a 115 innocent  children, many of whom were between the age of seven and ten along with, five of their teachers, in what is now known  today as one  of one of Wales worst mining disasters in it's history, not forgetting Senghennydd which I've written about previously when in 1913 over 400 were killed.https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/100th-anniversary-of-senghenydd-mine.html
By the time the landslide stopped, it had demolished Pantglyn Junior School and 20 houses, severely damaging the Secondary School.

The sores and wounds of this disaster are now forever  stored in the memories  and feelings of the people of Wales because of the whole collective loss of a generation that was wiped out. We should try never to  forget  the children and adults who died, this human tragedy, that  many say could easily have been  prevented. The National Coal Board  (NCB) were repeatedly warned to move the slag heaps to a safer location, because they were also  close to natural underwater springs. Did the NCB have the decency to acknowledge their blame, to bow their head in shame, like hell no, but we were to  learn sadly far too late that the NCB was ostensibly a capitalist organisation more concerned with profit than lives.  A report by the government at the time said " Blame  for the disaster rests upon  the National Coal Board. The legal liabilities of the National Coal Board to pay compensation for the  personal injury ( fatal or otherwise) and  damage to property is incontestable and uncontested." The Government of the day was also extremely insensitive to the victims families, and people whould have to wait for years, for compensation.
So tonight I hope you can catch the programme scheduled,  remember  the people of Aberfan, a community  that is still profoundly affected by this disaster, one in three survivors still  suffering from Post traumatic stress,  nearly 50 years after this tragic event took place. People felt guilty that they were  left alive, they did not feel like survivors,there were cases of children not being allowed to play in the street, in case it upset other parents.
Let us  hope that lessons learnt from this incident can be learnt for tomorrow, and  remember that this bitter legacy still continues, what with continuing social and economic problems in the South Wales valleys still  being wrought  because of successive governments who have made lives a  continuing source of discomfort.  Combined with the failure of responsibility by the relevant authorities and the appalling behaviour of  some parties in the aftermath of the disaster.
Today, however there is very  little to remind visitors of  this tragedy, just an abstract memorial garden in the village and the childrens section in the graveyard.I hope that those too young to remember this injustice will continue to be reminded of this awful event that the people of Aberfan remember every single day.
In addition to the programme mentioned , Sir Karl Jenkins has composed a major new choral work, entitled ; Cantala Memoria - For the Children which was commissioned  by S4C, the Welsh language channel in commemoration and mark the 50th anniversary of the disaster.
Lest we forget, people before profit.

 Karl Jenkins - lament for the valley

R.I.P the little angels that were lost forever.

Respect to former Pink Floyd singer and songwriter Roger Waters

 

Respect to former Pink Floyd singer and songwriter Roger Waters who made his feelings about Donald Trump and Israel clear during a politically-charged performance in his set that closed out a three-day classic rock concert in Indio, California on Sunday night. .

As Waters performed the Pink Floyd song Pigs, Donald Trump’s face appeared on the massive video screen above the stage as a swine-shaped balloon with a caricature of the Republican presidential candidate floated in the crowd.On the side of the balloon “Ignorant, lying, racist, sexist,” was written as well as screens flashing quotes from Trump, including comments from a controversial video from 2005 released last week. Subsequent images showed Trump wearing a Ku Klux Klan hood.

Trump's desire to build a wall on the Mexican  also annoyed Waters, who acknowledged the hypocrisy inherent in a country whose population largely descended from immigrants.Waters followed up with "Another Brick in the Wall (Part II)," during which 15 school-age children came onstage wearing T-shirts that read, "Derriba el muro" — Spanish for "Take down the wall." 

While other Desert Trip performers mentioned the presidential election, Waters was also the only one who brought up the Black Lives Matter movement in front of the overwhelmingly white audience. As he performed "Us and Them," the big screen showed pictures of protest signs. "White silence is violence," read one. "I cannot believe I still have to protest this (expletive)," another said.
Waters told the crowd that he's been working with wounded warriors in Washington, D.C., and brought a young American veteran who lost his legs onstage to play lead guitar with the band on "Shine on You Crazy Diamond.""Working with these men has been one of the most rewarding things I've ever done in my life," Waters said. He dedicated the song to all victims of war and violence.
Waters waited until near the end of his performance to voice his support for the Palestinian-led BDS movement. He said: “I’m going to send out all of my most heartfelt love and support to all those young people on the campuses of the universities of California who are standing up for their brothers and sisters in Palestine and supporting the BDS movement,” he said, “in the hope that we may encourage the government of Israel to end the occupation.”

Roger Waters is a well known critic of Israel who openly supports the BDS movement. Waters in February told a British newspaper that many musicians are afraid to call out Israel over it’s policies in relation to Palestinians as they see the backlash he has absorbed since supporting the BDS movement.

“The only response to BDS is that it is anti-Semitic,” Waters told the newspaper. “I know this because I have been accused of being a Nazi and an anti-Semite for the past 10 years.”

Waters openly calls for other artists to boycott Israel and to not perform there as pioneering electronic dance act the chemical brothers are planning to do on November 12th. A band I may add I have long admired. Music and other forms of art don't exist purely on an elevated artistic platform that is separated from the mundane world. What makes it significant is its connection and effect to the everyday reality.
As Tom Rowland himself said in an interview back in 2005: “Music is bigger than us."
Israel takes advantage of this, by using culture as a form of propaganda to whitewash and justify its regime of occupation, settler-colonialism and apartheid over the oppressed Palestinian people.
This is no secret. Israeli government officials have summed up how Israel exploits culture in order to cover up its severe violations of international law.On that note there is a petition up and running, that urges this band to respect the cultural boycott. You can sign here, if you wish :-

https://www.causes.com/actions/1786127-sign-the-petition-to-the-chemical-brothers?recruiter_id=189304238&utm_campaign=recruiter_link_inviter_copyable&utm_medium=recruiter_link&utm_source=causes.

 Before closing with "Vera" and "Comfortably Numb," Waters told the audience, "It's been a huge honor and a huge pleasure to be here to play for you tonight."His set also included "Time," ''Money," ''Wish You Were Here" and "Dark Side of the Moon."
So good that in this divided world there are still individuals like Mr Waters, who are prepared  to use their voices to continue to stand up and be counted. Sadly every age brings fresh injustice,and  those who speak out will continue  to be derided but at least theyat least  have the spines to use their voice to raise awareness, showing solidarity with those  that are often ignored, so thank you Roger for sharing your humanity.

Roger Waters - Another brick in the wall Part 2 Mexico 2016

Roger Waters - Pigs ( Three Different Ones)
Live, Mexico City Oct 1 2016

earlier  thoughts on Donald Trump

https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/intolerantina-poem-for-donald-trump.html 

Austerity Bites .

(guess I've become fixated. My first response to May)

There  is something in the air
and we breathe it everyday
a war of attrition
an ugly game of lies
as the politics of austerity
bites and pinches our lives.

Today, this country
is no gentle place
the sky full of tory toxitity
as they tear apart the welfare state
and so much more.

Easy to lose control
trying to feed hungry hearts
all we need is love they say
but on poverty's line
it's the only thing 
we have now for free.

It feels like 1979 again
but with more of a sting
as  politicians pickpocket
daily from our purse
and bankers bonuses still pile high.

Silence is not golden
time for them to hear us shout
beyond their false mirrors
no use just complaining
in the darkness we must sow light  
as they treat us with derision
time to drive these bastards out.

(This statement is now complete.)

Nick Drake - Tomorrow is a long time

Nick Drake singing Bob Dylan's ' Tomorrow is a long time '

I absolutely adore the sentiments as well as the  background noises.

If today was not an endless dream?

If today was not an endless highway
If tonight was not a crooked trail
If tomorrow wasn’t such a long time
Then lonesome would mean nothing to you at all
Yes, and only if my own true love was waitin’
Yes, and if I could hear her heart a-softly poundin’
Only if she was lyin’ by me
Then I’d lie in my bed once again

I can’t see my reflection in the waters
I can’t speak the sounds that show no pain
I can’t hear the echo of my footsteps
Or can’t remember the sound of my own name
Yes, and only if my own true love was waitin’
Yes, and if I could hear her heart a-softly poundin’
Only if she was lyin’ by me
Then I’d lie in my bed once again

There’s beauty in the silver, singin’ river
There’s beauty in the sunrise in the sky
But none of these and nothing else can touch the beauty
That I remember in my true love’s eyes
Yes, and only if my own true love was waitin’
Yes, and if I could hear her heart a-softly poundin’
Only if she was lyin’ by me
Then I’d lie in my bed once again 

I, Daniel Blake

The new film by British filmmaker Ken Loach, I Daniel Blake won the Palme d'Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival.Focused on the Kafkaesque ordeals of a 59-year old widowed carpenter who puts up with  health allowance benefits after suffering a heart attack, it is an indictment of an entire social system in which Britain’s most vulnerable are being thrown overboard by a cold and cost-conscious bureaucracy that received its marching orders from the combined forces of New Labour and the Tories.
Daniel Blake (59) has worked as a joiner most of his life in Newcastle. Now, for the first time ever, he needs help from the State. He crosses paths with single mother Katie and her two young children, Daisy and Dylan. Katie’s only chance to escape a one-roomed homeless hostel in London has been to accept a flat in a city she doesn’t know, some 300 miles away.
Daniel and Katie find themselves in no-man’s land, caught on the barbed wire of welfare bureaucracy as played out against the rhetoric of ‘striver and skiver’ in modern-day Britain.
The movie's writer Paul Laverty has said the research team was stunned at how people with mental health issues and disabilities were targeted by the welfare cuts.He said people interviewed within the Department for Work and Pensions told them "they were humiliated at how they were forced to treat the public. There is nothing accidental about it."
The actress who plays the young single mother, Katie -- Hayley Squires -- who Daniel's character befriend, recently slammed anti-welfare "propaganda" that she said has turned working class people against each other. "Normal people are led to believe that this amount of people are on benefits and are therefore scroungers, and this amount of people are going to work to pay so that they can scrounge." "They've left us to argue among ourselves so they can keep doing what they are doing."
A must see film, ever so needed in the present time,which I confess already seen , but am looking forward again to seeing it among others, when it arrives in my local theatre from 18 November to 24 November.http://www.mwldan.co.uk/whatson/cinema-2d-sinema-2d/i-daniel-blake-15#.V_KxOiRVLIU I just hope this powerful tool has the actual ability to change things or at least manages to shame the Government and show people  exactly whats going on in the uk today,at job centres up and down the country and how the DWP really works, a  rotten system essposed, designed to demoralise and create pain and despair with conscious cruelty on a daily basis.
But for the Conservatives, under the direction of Theresa May the ideological destruction of our society continues, and they carry on regardless, with an ideological mission of punishing the poor and those most vulnerable
 I,Daniel Blake represents though clearly of this Governments  betrayal of people in need, wanting simple sustenance in order to survive Finally I just hope this powerful film will evoke sympathy and recognise the fact that daily people are being screwed by the Tories, faced by obstacles, in  complete denial of peoples need for dignity and respect .Of so much moral imperative, I look forward to the day, when we say enough is enough.In the meantime well done Ken for continuing to lend the poor and downtrodden a voice.I really hope that this film and its powerful indictment of life under Tory rule  is seen by as many as possible.

Everyday in pieces- A poem for National Poetry Day

Every day is in pieces
tired and weary
returning  twists  never fade
but food and love so nourishing
helps release some starlight,
beyond the misty clouds
barking loudly in the shadows
in the hide and seek of eternity.
Everyday comes in pieces
but surreptiously hope returns
hellbent on survival
over mountains soars
pausing in moments
always wanting more.

Solidarity with women activists as Israel intercepts boat seeking to break Gaza blockade

 

A boat full of women activists which was headed peacefully for the Gaza Strip was intercepted and commandeered by the Israeli Navy yesterday in international waters.The Women’s Boat to Gaza was making good progress on the Mediterranean and the women on board were excited about meeting the people on the shores of Gaza who were waiting for them. Some Palestinians even spent the night at the beach to greet them. At 9:58am EDT, flotilla organizers lost contact with the boat, Zaytouna-Oliva. The US Embassy confirmed that the boat was intercepted and Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that the Zaytouna-Oliva was boarded by members of the Israeli navy. The Israelis took control of the boat and rerouted it – under force – to the Israeli port of Ashdod. The activists were transferred to authorities “for further processing,” the Israeli military said in a statement late Wednesday.. It should be noted that it is an illegal act to attack civilian boats in this way..

Women from different parts of the world who care and feel passionately about the freedom of Palestine and Gaza had set sail to Gaza with two ships the Zaytouna and the Amal - meaning "olive" and "hope" - had set sail last week from Barcelona, Spain, en route to the besieged Gaza Strip,in order to raise awareness about and try to break Israels decade-long illegal blockade of the Gaza Strip.The activists were transferred to authorities “for further processing,” the Israeli military said in a statement late Wednesday.

The boat dubbed “Women’s Boat to Gaza,” was carrying 13 women including Mairead Maguire, the 1976 Nobel peace laureate from Northern Ireland, Fauziah Hasan, a doctor from Malaysia, and retired US army colonel Ann Wright. The boat is part of the wider Freedom Flotilla Coalition that consists of pro-Palestinian boats that regularly seek to go to Gaza to try to break the blockade.

None has yet managed to get through yet..The flotilla is, at its core, a symbolic attempt to bring international attention to a blockade that has further impoverished and isolated Gaza, while sending a message of solidarity to Palestinians there.The Zaytouna-Oliva was carrying no material aid. This was by design because Israel, as a premise for their attacks, would claim that weapons and contraband were on board. The owner of Zaytouna-Oliva is Israeli.
Previous solidarity boats to Gaza have been intercepted and their passengers detained in Israel and deported.Eight Turkish nationals and a US citizen were killed in May 2010 when Israeli forces stormed the Mavi Marmara boat that was part of the Gaza Freedom. The people in Gaza were excited about the boat of women activists making their way to them in an attempt to break the illegal siege and blockade that plagues their everyday lives The people in Gaza were excited about the boat of women activists making their way to them in an attempt to break the illegal siege and blockade that plagues their everyday lives, a group of Palestinians had gathered on the beach in the hopes of welcoming the boat to shore but the vessel was intercepted before it could reach them.Earlier in the day they had heard the terrifying sounds of Israeli bombs near their homes,as Israel bombed several areas

                   
                            Palestinian women waiting on the shore to greet the Women's Boat to Gaza            
                                
The all-women boat also wanted to bring awareness to  the role of Palestinian women in their struggle, as they face the effects of occupation and settler-colonialism, under a illegal blockade.legal blockade. Over 1.5 million most of whom under 20 years of age are struggling to survive in Israeli occupied Gaza. Israel keeps violating the international law. According to the studies Gaza is estimated to become unsuitable for life by 2020. Turning the city into an inhabitable place undeniably is a crime against humanity. Women also carry the bulk of responsibility for the care of traumatized children. According to the United Nations, more than 160,000 children in Gaza are in need of continuous psychological support,United Nations officials have also called for the blockade to be lifted, saying conditions are deteriorating in Gaza.
 Sondos Ferwana, a spokesperson for the activists, told a Turkish news agency that the capture of the boat was “another act of Israeli piracy.”The Women’s Boat to Gaza group released a pre-recorded video statement made in case the boat was intercepted.“If you’re listening to this, then you will know that myself and all the women who sailed on the Women’s Boat to Gaza have been arrested and are in detention in Israel,” Maguire says in the video, which can be viewed above.Maguire adds that Israel’s actions are “totally illegal.”The Women’s Boat to Gaza Twitter account published photos of solidarity protests in Spain as news of the boat’s capture reached activists.

The last message heard  from Mairead Maguire stated: "We are people of the world, we should be allowed to bisit our brothers and sisters in Gaza and not be stopped. We will continue to support the people of Gaza and the people of Palestine until they have human rights and their freedom."Solidarity to all these brave women taken, we must demand that Israel acts immediately to ensure the safety and well being of the crew and passengers on board the Zaytoun-Olive, and must continue to call for the end of the blockade. No country has the right to isolate and collectively punish them against international law. Not only were Israels actions illegal, but they set a terryfying precedent, giving a greenlight for other nations to attack civilian ships in international waters. If in the UK, I would urge you without delay to contact the foreign secretary Boris Johnson, details are here, more contacts at bottom of post.:-

Boris Johnson, Foreign Secretary
Phone: +44 20 7219 4682
E-mail: boris.johnson.mp@parliament.uk
Twitter: @borisjohnson
Facebook: facebook.com/foreignoffice
Twitter: @foreignoffice

 Palestinian boats go out to meet the vessel but it was intercepted before it could reach shore.

Song for Gaza from Zaytouna-Oliva, Women's Boat For Gaza

"We anchored up and sail out from the shore of Spain
Our boat Zaytouna-Olive is her name
And olive is the symbol of a faraway place
To which we steer our course across the waves

We are thirteen women here to sail with peace in our hand
Towards our sisters in this foreign land
From many different corners of this world we have come
To bring to you the freedom of a song

[Chorus]

We will sail for your freedom
Our sisters in Palestine
We will never be silence
Until you are free
We are guided by the light of the stars at night
And the power of the sea so very bright
As the world is watching us we bring our women voice
With a message that we all should have a choice
Your grandmothers they planted olive trees
Upon the land where you should live in peace
Though trees of thousand years they've been all go away
May daughters plant the seeds to let them stay

[Chorus]
We will sail for your freedom
Our sisters in Palestine
We will never be silence
Until you are free"

Synne Sofie Recksten, Emma Rinqvist, Marama Davidson

For more details about the Womens boat to Gaza and other people to contact, here is a link :-

https://wbg.freedomflotilla.org/

80th Anniversary : Remember the Battle of Cable Street; No pasaran

                                Detail from Cable Street Mural
 
On the 9th October 2016 anti-fascists from across the UK will come together to mark the 80th anniversary of the Battle of Cable Street. Socialists, Trade Unionists and anti racism groups will march from Altab Ali Park to Cable Street where a rally will be held to commemorate the defeat of fascism in London's East End eighty years ago.

" No Pasaron"/ They Shall Not Pass!!"

On 4th October, 1936, the people of the East End inflicted a massive defeat on Sir Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists.
During this time Britain was facing very serious economic problems. Throughout the mid 1930s, the BUF moved closer towards Hitler’s form of fascism with Mosley himself saying that “fascism can and will win in Britain”. The British fascists took on a more vehemently anti-Semitic stance, describing Jews as “rats and vermin from whitechapel” and tried to blame Jews for the cause of the country's problems. Mosley’s blackshirts had been harassing the sizeable Jewish population in the East End all through the 1930s. By 1936 anti-semitic assaults by fascists were growing and windows of Jewish-owned businesses were routinely smashed. Hurrah for the Blackshirts!’  The notorious Daily Mail headline is just one chilling indication of the very real threat Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists posed in the mid 1930s.
On Sunday Oct. 4, 1936, Mosley planned to lead his Blackshirt supporters on a march through the East End, following months of BUF meetings and leafleting in the area designed to intimidate Jewish people and break up the East End’s community solidarity. Despite a petition signed by 100,000 people, the British government permitted the march to go ahead and designated 7,000 members of the police force to accompany it.
They were not to be welcomed, instead they were met by over 250,000 protestors, waving banners with slogans such as 'They shall not Pass'( no pasaron, famous republican slogan from the Spanish Civil War) , 'No Nazis here' and 'East End Unite.'  A mighty force had assembled prepared to defend their streets and neighbourhoods and their right to live in them.
As the fascists assembled in Royal Mint Street, near the Tower, they were attacked by large groups of workers. When the Metropolitan Police tried to clear a path through Gardiner’s Corner, a blockade of tens of thousands of people stood firm. Anti-fascists blocked the route by barricading the street with rows of domestic furniture and the fascists and the police who were defending them were attacked with eggs, rotten fruit and the contents of chamber pots. Local kids rolled marbles under police horses hooves. A mighty battle ensued, leaving many injured and others arrested.
80 years later it is remembered because it saw thousands of people, from many walks of life, women, children, local jews, Irish groups, communists, socialists, anarchists standing firm as one in an incredible display of unity who worked together to prevent Mosley's fascists from marching through a Jewish area in London.Together, they won a famous victory and put the skids under Britain’s first fascist mass movement.The  fascists did not get to march and they did not pass, and were left in humiliation so today we look back on this living history in celebration and pride.
Significantly, for some people that were involved in the protest, Cable Street was the road to Spain, and many would go on to volunteer as soldiers for the Republicans there, this year also marks the 80th anniversary founding of the International Brigades. The legend that was Cable Street became the lasting inspiration for the continuing British fight against the fascism that was spreading all across Europe and would eventually engulf the planet in a terrible world war.
We might like to think those days are behind us, but anti-semitism, racism and intolerance  is on the rise. The far-right are growing throughout Europe. Following the divisive and anti-immigrant rhetoric surrounding Brexit to fuel a spike in reports of racist hate crimes. The winds that blew across Cable Street eighty years ago still exist today, we must remain vigilant to this. We should never forget the Battle of Cable Street. Teach your kids about it. 
Today and tomorrow we must still rally around the cry of No Pasaran - They shall not pass.

Men they couldn't hang - Ghosts of Cable Street

Phillipines: Stop Encouraging Murder

When comparing yourself to world leaders or historical figures, there are perhaps less controversial choices than Adolf Hitler. Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte last Friday likened himself to the Nazi leader, saying he wants to kill millions of drug addicts, just as Hitler killed Jews during the Holocaust.

"Hitler massacred 3 million Jews. Now there is 3 million, what is it, 3 million drug addicts (in the Philippines), there are," he said in a speech in his hometown of Davao City.

"I'd be happy to slaughter them. At least if Germany had Hitler, the Philippines would have (me). You know my victims, I would like (them) to be all criminals, to finish the problem of my country and save the next generation from perdition."

History counts the cost of Hitler's purges against "undesirables" at 11 million, 6 million of whom were Jews.

World Jewish Congress President Ronald Lauder, in Israel to attend the funeral of former Prime Minister Simone Peres, condemned the remarks.

"These statements are revolting, and President Duterte must retract them and apologize," Lauder said. "We just marked the 75th anniversary of Babi Yar, the massacre of more than 33,000 Jews in Ukraine by Nazi Germany. ... Now, the elected leader of the Philippines openly calls for the mass murder of people who are addicted to drugs.

"Drug abuse is a serious issue. But what President Duterte said is not only profoundly inhumane, but it demonstrates an appalling disrespect for human life."

 Amnesty International said that Duterte "has sunk to new depths" and urged governments around the world to condemn his "extremely dangerous outburst."

On Sunday  Duterte issued an  his apology saying  it was intended only for the Jewish community. He lashed out again at Western critics and human rights advocates who have raised concerns over his brutal crackdown, which is estimated to have left more than 3,000 suspected drug dealers and users dead in just three months. Duterte said in a speech in the central city of Bacolod that he never had any intention "to derogate the memory of the 6 million Jews murdered by the Germans." "I apologize profoundly and deeply to the Jewish community," Duterte said.
A little to late methinks.The controversial leader campaigned on a hard line against crime, particularly drug offenses, and has in the past uttered statements which have caused many in the international community to recoil.Since winning the presidential election, President Duterte triggered widespread alarm by calling for the restoration of the death penalty, vowing to preside over a wave of extrajudicial executions, threatening journalists, and intimidating human rights defenders.
This is in a context where a climate of impunity for human rights violations prevails in the Philippines, including for torture and other ill-treatment by the police. Only one police officer has ever been brought to justice under laws criminalising torture, and few have been held accountable for killings of journalists.  A growing number of critics, including U.N. officials, the European Union and the United States, have voiced concerns over the widespread killings and human rights violations.

The country’s new president is running a ‘war on drugs’ that involves a deadly crackdown on anyone believed to be connected to the drugs trade. He has suggested there might be monetary rewards for those who murder people and is seemingly encouraging the police to kill.

Call on authorities in the Philippines to stop sanctioning murder and to protect the right to life for all citizens. Tell this man he has to stop:

You can take action via Amnesty International  here:-

https://www.amnesty.org.uk/actions/philippines-stop-murder-drugs-president-duterte

Roy Bailey - The Ballad of Vic Williams

The right to conscientious objection has also been recognised in the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights. Recently, the legal right to act in accordance with one's conscience has been placed on the statute book by the Government through the Human Rights Act 1998.
In the First World War, about 16,000 British men were recorded as conscientious objectors after conscription started in 1916, In the Second World War, there were 61,000. Conscription was abolished in 1960, so all British soldiers are now volunteers – although in 1991 Vic Williams a soldier  was jailed for 14 months for desertion and conduct prejudicial to the good order of discipline, after he went absent without leave during the Gulf War. Vic Williams said he left the regiment because he did not believe that a military solution to the Gulf crisis was justified, and because he had decided that his conscience could not allow him to take part in any such action.  He had served in the British Army for five years as a trained radar operator before his departure, and had a clean conduct record.  Before giving himself up to the police at the end of the Gulf War in early March, Vic Williams made public statements opposing the war for oil in a Hyde Park demonstration and on a BBC television programme . Amnesty International at the time considered him to be a prisoner of conscience, imprisoned because he acted in accordance with his conscientiously held beliefs.
He began serving his prison sentence on 2 October 1991. The above video is of Roy Bailey singing “The Ballad of Vic Williams.”