18th edition, 30 April 2015 – Pike & Hurricane

UF Malmö Goes to Georgia

Mia Shoua — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 21:26:17 +0000

On the 30th of March twelve UF Malmö members embarked on a seven day trip to Georgia. The country’s capital city of Tbilisi is often considered to form the vibrant, bustling and eclectic central city of the Caucasus region and this was indeed an image presented to us as we explored the new sights and culture in awe. We noted the traces of Georgia’s time under Soviet Rule in the city streets, symbols of the unique and ancient cultural heritage, the heavy presence and influence of the Georgian Orthodox Church as well as elements of Eastern and indeed Orientalist culture. We found the culture and environment to be like nothing we had encountered before and unique to this vital location at the crossroads between Europe and Asia. However, the contrast between traces of the Soviet era and efforts towards modernisation define the struggle to develop a modern country since emerging from the Soviet Union as an independent state in 1991 and amidst ongoing tensions in the Caucasus region.

The main theme of the trip focused on Georgia’s political landscape. Georgia is said to be considered by many to be “the balcony of Europe”. This came under evaluation through discussion of the country’s aspirations to join NATO and the EU. Visits to various political and educational organisations and institutions lead to us experiencing a multiplicity of perspectives and opinions on subjects of Georgia’s economic and political development. The week began with a visit to Tbilisi State University where we received a lecture on the past and current political landscape from Professor Alexandre Kukhianidze. The educational visit painted a clear and vital backdrop to the contemporary issues of the nation’s threats and challenges further discussed and debated throughout the week.

A visit to the Embassy of Sweden in Georgia was fruitful in defining the links and relations between Georgia and UF Malmö’s own country of origin as well as prospects for Georgia’s growth, development and potential EU membership from the Swedish political perspective. Moreover, we discussed the value and history of Georgia’s relations to Sweden based on economic and strategic reasons. Upon our visit to the Embassy of Germany in Georgia we encountered the same wealth of knowledge and opinion on Georgia’s joining the EU and NATO, but from a perspective aligned with Germany’s own interests in and relations with Georgia and the greater Caucasus region. Furthermore, the United Nations Development Programme in Georgia hosted us and the Head of UN Georgia, Mr. Niels Scott, discussed with us the vision of the UN in relations to Georgia as well as its own perspective on the country’s development and challenges in achieving this.

We gained an additional insight into the experiences of the youth in Georgia as well as the degree of public involvement and social and political motivation in civil society upon our visit to the Future Diplomats’ Club and the Ministry of Sport and Youth Affairs. This was vital in providing us a view of the social aspect of the nation’s development, in contrast to the discussions solely focused upon the political and economic spheres. Moreover, the Information Center on NATO and EU provided a perspective widely held in Georgia which is in favour of joining the EU as well as NATO. This is based on Georgia’s aims toward political and economic growth and development as well as its perceived need for strong and effective national security. However, there remained a looming question in discussions of this topic of whether Georgia truly knows the meaning of being an EU member state in terms of commonly held values and social standards (such as on topics of LGBT rights and gender equality) and whether the nation can compromise its conservative political nature in this regard.

We also jumped at any opportunity to experience and explore important Georgian sites and culture. During the week we gladly indulged in the delicious local cuisine consisting of Georgian dishes like“Khachapuri”, “Lobiani”, and “Khinkali”, as well as visiting the Dry Bridge Bazaar flea market and exploring the streets of Tbilisi’s Freedom Square and old Town to grasp the flow of daily life in the city. Additionally, on a trip to the beautiful nearby city of Mtskheta, which received the title of the “Holy City” by the Georgian Orthodox Church, we visited the church of Svetitskhoveli during the Georgian Christian Orthodox celebrations of Palm Sunday. A further example of religious sites we visited is the Jvari Monastery, which is a Georgian Orthodox monastery from the sixth century listed as a World Heritage site by UNESCO. It was an additional awe inspiring sight. Situated on a rocky mountain top, it offered a panoramic view of the city of Mtskheta close by as well as the confluence of the Mtkvari and Aragavi rivers and snow-capped mountains in the distance. Within Tbilisi we visited the Holy Trinity Cathedral of Tbilisi (commonly known as Sameba), which is known as the main Georgian Orthodox Cathedral and is the third-tallest Eastern Orthodox Cathedral in the world.

Finally, upon the final day of our trip, a meeting with the Delegation of the European Union to Georgia’s Mr.Radoslaw Darski (Head of Political, Press and Information Section) and his Deputy Ms. Dorota Dlouchy-Suliga proved to be a valuable summation of the information and opinions we had encountered throughout the trip. Often times the parties portray differing viewpoints but more poignantly they portray different economic, political and social interests- which inspired critical thinking and analyst on the part of the UF delegation. However, essentially what we noted was the existence of an identity crisis played out in the geopolitical sphere, in a country which is aiming to define and establish itself in the world both economically and politically between the two worlds of the East and the West.

Overall, we each learned greatly from the trip and had an unforgettable experience. The relatively small Caucasian country mostly famed for its traditions, hospitality and cuisine and currently in the throes of interstate tensions, frozen conflicts and the looming threat of Russia won over our hearts and served to inspire further passion for each of our areas of academia, political sciences and international relations.

Related articles:

UF Malmö Goes to Athens

UF trip to Albania

Photo credits:

Carolin Jamusch for UF Malmö

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Unheard South Solidarity: The Asian-African Conference

Fajar Adhiprabawa — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 19:09:29 +0000

Last April, heads of state, ministers, and high officials from Asia and Africa began arriving in the Indonesian cities of Jakarta and Bandung to attend a particularly significant event. The summit was held in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the Asian-African Conference (KAA) in 1955.

The original KAA Conference was the result of an initiative by Indonesia’s 8^th Prime Minister Ali Sastroamidjojo. Mr. Ali believed that a cooperation between the Asia and Africa regions is integral for development in the regions and international peace and security. The meeting, also known as the ‘Bandung Conference’, was organised by Indonesia, Burma, India, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan.

The countries that attended the Conference believed in similar ideas for development and governance, as they shared fundamental opposition against colonialism and the bipolar global politics that marked that era. This would then lead to the birth of the well-known Non-Aligned Movements. The Conference saw Asian and Afican countries share largely similar characteristics, most being newly-independent and developing countries.

Facing new challenges ahead of them, Asian and African countries believe that some form of partnership is needed to build solidarity and develop together. This partnership is based on mutual views on respect for state sovereignty and territorial integrity, equality, peaceful settlement of disputes, and respect for fundamental human rights and justice.

The KAA Conference was influenced by great Asian leaders at the time, among them the first Indonesian President Soekarno, the first Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Burmese Prime Minister U Nu, and the former Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser.

The 1955 Asian-African Conference was attended by 29 countries’ delegates, and the cooperation was followed up on the commemoration of its 50^th anniversary in the 2005 Asian-African Summit.

The conclusion of the global bipolarity marking the Cold War era and the decolonisation of both Asian and African countries gave rise to concerns that this particular cooperation was losing its importance. However, Asian and African states are still facing many issues, from struggling to contain civil wars, combating security problems, fighting against poverty and pursuing economic development, to supporting proper education.

Attended by 89 heads of state and eleven more international organisation representatives, including then-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the 2005 Summit was key in strengthening ties between the regions.

The 2005 Summit provided a breakthrough in the development of the cooperation, as it gave birth to the New Asian–African Strategic Partnership (NAASP). Cooperation within this NAASP framework focuses on issues central to Asia and Africa’s development: counter-terrorism, food and energy security, higher education, gender equality, and the empowerment of women.

Several states from both regions champion each of these sector, and the scheme has seen Indonesia and South Africa to lead the others in promoting and delivering action plans. The quality of human resources in the regions has become the primary focus to trigger economic progress through technical cooperation and knowledge transfer.

With every year, the number of states participating in this summit increased. Representing nations comprising more than three quarters of the world’s population at 5.4 billion citizens combined, 109 countries’ delegates take part in this year’s summit.

The shared cause against colonialism and intervention was brought to the discussion by host country Indonesia, promoting the effort to support the independence of Palestine.

“An issue … merits out continued support and attention is the issue of Palestine. Indonesia remains steadfast in its unwavering support for an independent Palestine within the context of the two state solution,” Indonesia’s Foreign Affairs Minister Retno Marsudi remarked. “We should start talking about sanctions being imposed on Israel for violating international law and for negating the Palestinians basic rights.”

Another discussion of cooperation revolves around economic progress through trade. Despite it being not as significant as the trade with Europe and the Americas, direct trade between Asia and Africa is promising and expected to continue to increase. Recent trade deals have seen capital flows between the regions increase considerably. Sime Darby of Malaysia has started to develop oil palm plantations in Africa, while Zambeef of Zambia has invested in farms and husbandry, and investments in Ethiopia were made by the Indonesian company B-29.

To further cooperation, a separate meeting of the Asian-African Business Summit, bringing together CEOs from 47 countries in Asia and Africa’s leading businesses takes place at the same time in Jakarta. These business leaders are to discuss the expected improvement of business cooperation, trade, and investment in sectors of infrastructure, agribusiness, and maritime economy in particular.

The cooperation between Asia and Africa does not attract as much attention in global politics as other inter-region relationships, but is undoubtedly a much needed one. It is imperative for countries to fully support the New Asian–African Strategic Partnership built upon the Asian African Summits. Consisting of mostly developing countries, some struggling with conflict and extreme poverty, Asia and Africa need an ever-stronger solidarity in order to continue to rise and better themselves, together.

Photo credit:

Picture 1 & 2: GovernmentZA, licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

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In Search of a Golden Opportunity

Pam Tannous — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 13:32:49 +0000

In search for a better life, at least 146,000 female migrant domestic workers have moved to the UAE expecting a decent and respectful job as a housekeeper. The surge of migrant workers into the Middle East began in the early 1970s, when increased petroleum production brought with it a demand for skilled and unskilled labour. With this, many opportunities in the service sector for female labour expanded and today an estimated seventy-five percent of the UAE’s population are domestic workers. Choosing to leave their families due to a number of economic and social reasons, many immigrants come from Sri Lanka, Indonesia and the Philippines.

Life in the UAE may not turn out this glamorous

The golden opportunity that they were looking for turns out to be a place of hell. A report called “I Already Bought You” published by the Human Rights Watch highlights abuses of certain domestic workers in the UAE, focusing on female workers.

On arrival, their employers confiscate their passports and the next day the workers are shocked by the sheer amount of work. Cooking, cleaning, washing clothes and then cooking again is their daily routine without any rest, and when they ask to return back to the agency the answer they get is “I already bought you”, conveniently denying that they are human beings.

Many domestic workers in the UAE describe a range of abuses, which include; physical abuses, verbal abuses, failure of full wage payment to them, long hours of work without rest or days off, denial of adequate food, proper living conditions, and medical care. Some were even brought to the UAE for forced labour or trafficking.

Tired of their daily stress, many try to run away or seek help at a police station, but their pleas are commonly turned down. Instead, they are accused of lying because there is a lack of protection afforded to them under the UAE labour law. The problem is traced back to the “Kafala” (sponsorship) system which creates a tie between migrant workers and their visa sponsors meaning that the migrant workers can’t change employers. This system gives employers great power over employees because it entitles them to cancel their sponsorship only at their own will. This automatically removes the right of a worker to remain in the UAE in case the Kafala System was cancelled, and triggers repatriation procedures. Domestic workers in the UAE have no legal safeguard governing their employment and are thus excluded from the labour law and from the basic protections that the law and other labour policies afford to most other workers.

The Kafala system is not only employed in the UAE but also in other countries, including; Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and other Gulf Arab states such as Qatar.

The problem is not limited to the UAE

As reported earlier, in Qatar the violations against migrant workers are also very concerning. Hidden from the public, the preparations for holding the World Cup bring with them problems that have been ignored in favour of a successful event. The massive human rights violations that the domestic workers are facing are threatening their lives. The violations are unacceptable since even the basic needs of survival are being violated, such as the need of food, which has left many workers suffering from hunger.

The practice of the Kafala System has received much criticism by human rights organisations. For example, the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery has mentioned that the Kafala system can create extreme dependency, making it impossible for victims of servitude and other slavery-like practices to escape the situation of exploitation.

Due to international criticism, the UAE government has decided on reforms to the labour laws, which were intended to improve the working conditions for migrant workers. The improvements include one day off each week and eight hours of rest in any 24 hours period. However, this is less from what many workers were promised before arriving and far short of international standards.

A slum in Dubai

Contrary to what may be understood, many women who migrate to the Middle East are educated and skilled and are not on the edge of abject poverty. In fact many of these women come from lower-middle class families and take a proactive role in leaving the household in search of work. Although there is a key financial incentive to migrate, many women also do so because they are seeking adventure, independence, training, and upward social mobility. This means that these women are aware of the human rights that should be offered to them as promised and therefore many will attempt to run away or even commit suicide.

Migrating for work can certainly provide an opportunity, but only if the workers’ human rights are respected. Some female domestic workers in the UAE have good and responsible employers, satisfactory working conditions, receive their wages in full and on time and are able to remit money home to their families. Meanwhile, some are facing severe abuses and are in desperate need of help. Therefore it is important to remove the Kafala system or at least improve it since it is the leading cause of many problems and it does not respect basic human rights.

By Pamela Tannous

Image credit:

Picture 1: Crazy Diamond, licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

Picture 2: ILO in Asia and the Pacific, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Picture 3 : Christopher Augapfel, licensed under CC BY 2.0

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The Biggest Delusion about Terrorism

Evgenia Isaeva — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 12:45:19 +0000

“Not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslims”. Most people have probably heard this expression at some point in their lives. But not many have acknowledged how wrong it could be. Unfortunately, this idea is quite often taken for granted. For some reason people assume that the majority of terrorist attacks are committed by Muslims. However, the real situation turns out to be completely different from what most people think – adherents of other religions as well as non-religious people commit terrorist attacks quite often, too. When it comes to thinking of terrorism, most people tend to imagine a person blowing himself up in a public place. But, in fact, it would be more correct to think of terrorism as a violent act intended to intimidate population and pursue political goals.

9/11 has altered many peoples’ perceptions.

So how come so many people have a wrong idea of terrorism? Why do they always associate terrorism only with Islam and almost never see Christian, Buddhist or Jewish criminals as terrorists? Perhaps, we should blame the media and the way it presents information and portrays Muslims. If a crime is committed by a Muslim, it will draw more attention and provoke heated debates. An incident will be discussed in the media over and over again. Most likely, it will be viewed as a ‘terrorist attack’ straight away. Whereas, when an act of terrorism committed by a person or people of a different religion occurs, less attention is paid to the discussion about religious views of the person, and it will take time to confirm that the incident was a terrorist attack. In fact, many events would not be covered by the media at all. For example, not many people have heard of Italian anarchist group FAI that had already been operating and posing threat to national security in Italy and some other countries in Europe for more than 10 years. Criminal activity of this non-religious terrorist organization is rarely covered in the news.

Investigation of the statistical data provided by FBI and Europol indicates that religion does not have much to do with terrorism. Indeed, religiously inspired terrorism is a rare phenomenon. According to a Europol report, less than 2% of total amount of terrorist attacks in Europe are based on religious beliefs. In the US, where Muslims are frequently portrayed as perpetrators, Islamic terrorist attacks make up only 6%, which is even less then the number of terrorist attacks committed by Jewish extremists. Most of the terrorist acts are committed by adherents of other religions or have nothing to do with religion at all. Still, mostly terrorists are believed to be Muslims. Incidents with involvement of terrorists that are not connected with Islam are hardly ever discussed. The reason for that might be the fact that terrorist attacks committed by Islamists usually take lives of many people at the same time, while terrorist attacks committed by other factions usually claim only a few people’s lives.

So what is and is not associated with terrorism?

On the 24th of March 2015, the world witnessed the airplane crash in the French Alps that claimed the lives of 150 people. A few days later it was reported that the plane was crashed deliberately by the depressed co-pilot Andreas Lubitz. This person was called a ‘mass-murderer’ for his actions, no one accused him of being a terrorist. If Andreas Lubitz was somehow connected with Islam, then, the stereotype about terrorist attacks would probably be applied to this case without any explicit consideration, and some lights on the incident would be shed on the incident in a different way. But he was not a Muslim, and his religious views are not mentioned anywhere in the news reports. Therefore following this logic, it is fair to assume that terrorism is mostly associated with Islam simply due to labelling by the media.

Commemorating the terorist attack on Utoya

Another example of people’s unwillingness to label a non-Muslim person as a terrorist can be found in examining Norway attacks in 2011. A Norwegian perpetrator inspired by right-wing extremist ideology, Anders Behring Breivik, first blew up a car in the centre of Oslo, and then opened fire at teenagers in a summer camp on the island of Utøya. The horrible events that took place there shocked the whole of Europe, and provoked a lot of discussions and debates about the personality, objectives, and mental health of the murderer. This case, though, was not discussed much in the media outside of Europe.

Even though that case is now considered as terrorism, it took quite a lot of time to define it as such. In fact, a year had passed after the incident when the Norwegian court came to the conclusion that what Breivik had done was a terrorist attack. Especially in the beginning people tried to somehow justify his actions. Mental disorders were one of the main arguments to explain Breivik’s behavior. It is also important to mention that in this case religious views of the perpetrator inspired his actions. However, not in the usual way. As the terrorist claimed, he was ‘a 100% Christian’ and the reason for his actions was islamophobia. Perhaps reasons for the extreme length of the investigation as well as the trial to determine his punishment where that Norway aims to bear an image of being a safe country free from such severe crimes as terrorism, and that Breivik’s religious views did not fit in with the stereotypical concept of a Muslim-terrorist. Although no Islamic implications as a driving force for this massacre were found in this case, it is still a terrorist attack.

Still, even after the Norwegian court announced their verdict and proclaimed Breivik a terrorist, not everyone agreed with the statement. Deborah Orr, a journalist who works for ‘the Guardian’, announced that “Anders Behring Breivik is not a terrorist, he is a mass-murderer”. But what exactly makes some people distinguish terrorism from mass-murder? In this case especially, the event had political implications – Breivik’s actions were directed at the Norwegian government and their immigration policies.

Getting back to the initial belief of Islam being tightly connected with terrorism, it is important to mention once again that this idea is completely wrong and is mostly imposed on people by the media. As statistics reveal, religious implications and Muslims in general are not associated with terrorist attacks as often as most people imagine. Adherents of other religions as well as non-religious people led by extremist ideologies constitute the majority of terrorists. Therefore, people should not think of terrorism as committed only by Muslims and see all believers of Islam as terror suspects. Not all Muslims are terrorists, and not all terrorists are Muslim.

By Evgenia Isaeva

Image credit:

Picture 1: Jason Powell, licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

Picture 2: Dmitry Valberg, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

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WildLeaks: Fighting Wildlife Crime

Michael Schätzlein — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 11:55:39 +0000

Wildlife crime occurs all over the world and every day, there are new cases. These crimes do not go unnoticed, but as corrupt officials are often involved in covering up their tracks, reporting these crimes and naming suspects may be both futile and dangerous. How can one go about reporting these incidents anonymously? WildLeaks, an online project aimed at protecting the world from wildlife crime, may be the answer.

When WikiLeaks published almost 400,000 secret documents about the US involvement in Iraq and more than 250,000 United States diplomatic cables back in 2010, it invoked a strain on international relations and made WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange famous overnight. Similar to WikiLeaks, WildLeaks is targeting the big players: Rather than ratting out poachers, smugglers and other replaceable henchmen, WildLeaks seeks to catch the heads of the international networks behind these crimes.

Are being hunted for their horns: Rhinos

The initiative was started by Andrea Crosta, an Italian security analyst who is known for unravelling the links between the Somali terrorist organisation al-Shabaab and illegal ivory trade. It is sponsored by the Elephant Action League, a non-profit charity organisation also headed by Crosta, which is seeking to root out wildlife crime and ivory trade in particular.

In order to guarantee anonymity and provide safety from potential spectators for the informants, WildLeaks has set up a website hidden within the network of the infamous anonymising service Tor. The 18 interface languages on the website make the project more accessible to its global audience. After a tip-off, a small team of experts review and verify the information. After that, they collect additional data and contact their trusted partners, law enforcement agencies or media outlets that are able to help putting the crimes to an end, all while doing their best to keep their sources anonymous.

Smuggled ivory is being prepared for destruction

The reasons for these rigid security measures are quite obvious. Nowadays, wildlife crime is a well-organised industry with revenue estimated at $19 billion per year, making it the fourth largest illegal activity worldwide, with narcotics, counterfeiting and human trafficking heading the field. Increasingly, the activities are orchestrated by international criminal cartels and terrorist organisations. This means that any interest in the activities can be dangerous and sometimes even lethal. In October of 2014, a Cambodian journalist was killed after reporting illegal logging activities to the local authorities. A soldier and two policemen were arrested in connection with the crimes, marking the deep-running corruption that is instrumentalised by the crime networks.

Many of these activities have been fuelled by globalisation and China’s fast rise in economic strength. This has created an ever-growing middle and upper class that are able to obtain some of the rarest ingredients traditional Chinese medicine makes use of, such as ivory or parts of feline predators. Today, more than half of the ivory shipments seized in Kenya are destined for China. In just five years, from 2009 to 2014, the recorded amount of rhinos poached in South Africa has risen tenfold. This has put a severe strain on the populations of the very few rhinos that are left and pushes them to the edge of extinction.

This hike in the illegal trade with animal parts has caused an outrage amongst wildlife preservationists, but the politics still lag behind when it comes to introducing reforms that would inhibit wildlife crime severely. Wildlife protection is a field that many states seem to have a lot of problems to agree on. Even if they can decide on a common policy, the resulting charters are voluntary for the signatory states, which in return undermines the whole purpose of these treaties. Slowly but surely, increased punishments and more coherent international policies are put into place, but will it be fast enough to save the beating heart of our planet?

Rangers patrolling the Ulu Masen forest in Aceh, Indonesia

While that remains to be seen, WildLeaks fills an important niche in the fight against wildlife crime, one that traditional police organisations have not been able to cover. The expert know-how and technical security measures give this initiative an advantage over local police forces that allows WildLeaks to be active worldwide. WildLeaks went through a three-month trial period in 2014, during which 24 twenty-four tip-offs were made. The crimes reported were not just restricted to ivory trade, as one might think. Amongst the tip-offs were activities such as illegal fishing in Alaska, the killing of endangered Sumatran tigers, and illegal logging in Malawi, Mexico and Siberia. As evaluating the information is a very slow process and as WildLeaks also has an obligation to protect its sources, only few tip-offs to law enforcement agencies have been made public yet.

By Michael Schätzlein

Image credit:

Picture 1: Lawrence OP, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Picture 2: Kate Miyamoto / USFWS Mountain-Prairie, licensed under CC BY 2.0

Picture 3: Abbie Trayler-Smith / Panos Pictures / DFID – UK Department for International Development, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

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Collective Weddings to Fight Inequality

Victoria Yantseva — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 04:19:30 +0000

Wedding is a costly celebration, ask anyone who has ever been married. In some countries, a couple is expected to invite anywhere from 100 to 400 guests to the ceremony. In others, the bride’s relatives might have to save up money for a dowry, which is then given to the groom’s family as “payment” for the bride. Not many families can afford to uphold these traditions. Striving to eliminate this injustice, governments and local communities in some countries have found a way out: collective weddings.

A collective wedding is a matrimonial ceremony that is held for several couples simultaneously. It can be hosted by a government, a civil organisation, an individual donor, or in some cases by the couples’ parents. Collective weddings are popular in India, Japan, South Korea and Muslim countries, such as Iran or Afghanistan.

A collective wedding held in Macedonia

Marriage has a sacral meaning for many people around the world. Thus, there is small wonder that even families from lower classes tend to spend what little they have on these occasions. By being unable to afford these expensive celebrations, they fall in a vicious circle of debt and poverty. However, in collective weddings all the costs are either shared by participants or are paid by a third party. Thus, men and women from underprivileged families get a chance to a decent life without getting themselves into debt bondage for the rest of their lives.

This is especially relevant for the families that plan to marry off their daughters. In some countries the parents of the bride have to pay a dowry, so that the girl might have a good start in the new family. While paying a dowry is officially illegal in most countries, it is still happening in India, Bangladesh and other places. For a girl, paying a large dowry is one way to “buy” herself into a better future. If her family is wealthy enough, she may choose a well-educated man from a respected family; if not, she might have to settle for someone less prosperous. Apart from being humiliating in its nature, the dowry tradition creates many cases of domestic violence towards women. For instance, in 2012 one Indian woman was killed every hour because her parents were unable to pay the dowry that the groom’s family demanded.

When it comes to collective weddings, the dowry is often (but not always) paid to the bride by the government or by the organisation holding the wedding ceremony. The happy couple may also receive a wedding gift, or a “bridal gift”, consisting of furniture, electronic devices and other useful things. These gifts help to take the financial burden from bride’s relatives and reduce the likelihood of domestic violence to occur in the new family.

One of the organisations holding collective weddings in Pakistan is called Minjah Welfare Foundation. As of now, the organisation has married over 700 couples and spent over one million Euro on this purpose. According to the Foundation’s rules, each spouse can invite up to fifty guests to the ceremony. It also takes care of “a proper wedding atmosphere”, the dowry and bridal gifts such as a double bed, a gas stove, a sewing machine, etc. In total, one couple’s wedding’s cost is worth 150,000 Pakistani rupees, or approximately 1360 Euro.

Not everyone may be able to afford the luxury of a proper wedding

In India, a famous businessman, Mahesh Savani, is known for his support in organising marriages for “fatherless” girls. He started by marrying off two girls several years ago, and in 2014 he sponsored wedding ceremonies for one hundred eleven couples. All these women who received aid from Savani had lost their fathers and had an underprivileged background. They were, therefore, unable to sponsor their own weddings. Savani did not only pay for the ceremony itself, but also made generous gifts to the couples.

In Kano, a predominantly Muslim Nigerian state, a series of mass weddings were organised by local authorities. The main aim of these ceremonies was to promote family values andto reduce the number of divorces and births out of wedlock. Apart from organising the ceremonies, the authorities also paid for the brides’ dowries and gave some useful presents to the newly married couples. Just as in other cases, the main beneficiaries of the ceremonies were people from lower-class families. Special attention was given to widowed and divorced Nigerian women, who often end up being involved in prostitution and begging in the streets. Kano’s authorities also played the role of a match-maker by helping some women to find a suitable partner.

However, special attention should be paid to the fact that all marriages should be conducted with the full consent of those getting married, especially girls. In many cases, collective weddings protect women from abuse and injustices; but if somebody is married against their will, the whole meaning of collective weddings is lost. The obligation to marry the person one does not like or an obligation to marry unwillingly is an abuse itself. Still, when conducted correctly, collective weddings solve many of the problems that underprivileged families are confronted with, such as dowry payments and domestic violence as well as helping newly weds start out a new life together.

By Victoria Yantseva

Image credit:

Picture 1: Marjan Lazarevski, licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

Picture 2: jit bag, licensed under CC BY 2.0

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Lessons Learned from Chapel Hill

Naseem Garcha — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 04:03:37 +0000

On February 10th this year, three American Muslim students were shot and killed in their own home by a white Atheist male, allegedly over a parking dispute. Days before her death, one of the victims had told her father that the killer “hates us for what we are and how we look”. Whether or not it was a crime of hate seems to be irrelevant since most media outlets barely covered the story as is. Subsequently, the clear lack of media attention provoked many questions from the Muslim communities in America. If it had been a hate crime against Muslims would we have heard more about it? If the tables were turned and it was three white students murdered by a Muslim man wouldn’t CNN or NBC or Fox news be crying “terrorist!”? Such concerns had been expressed after the shooting via social media outlets such as Twitter. Not only was the Muslim community outraged but many minority groups exclaimed their frustrations with American and European media outlets, using the hashtag #MuslimLivesMatter.

A protest after the Chapel Hill shootings

In truth, Islamophobia is growing, not only in America but all over the world. And it seems, at times, that certain Western media outlets are doing all they can to nurture this hate by spreading negative representations of Islam or in the case of the Chapel Hill shooting, a pure lack of representation. Some have speculated that it started with the “War on Terror” and by painting Muslims as savages and pinning them together with extremists, the American and European media has dehumanised an entire group of people and made it easier for the western world to turn a blind eye when our governments bomb thousands of civilians.

For me it started when the Towers fell, I must have been 9 years old and I remember the way things changed for my family. I remember how people treated my brown father giving him suspicious looks. And how he had bought us American flag stickers to stick on our cars so people would know we loved America, he made it seem like a game but he was scared and he yelled when I put way too many on one window. They’ll think we’re trying too hard, he said. I can’t forget the time my best friend told me we needed to kill all Muslims, even the children because they’ll just grow to be evil, or how her mom had heard her and didn’t say anything, she merely laughed.

Things were bad but we were safe, as long as people knew we weren’t Muslim, we were Sikh, it’s different. Things were much worse for my Muslim classmates. I watched as kids donning confederate flag T-shirts threw cans and garbage at a girl wearing a hijab, the bus driver watched too but didn’t do anything. And my friend Michael, an exchange student from Pakistan was beat up by a bunch of rednecks, and when he finally fought back he was suspended for a week. In truth, this segregation never really went away, and today it has become much worse with the Charlie Hebdo attacks, the Chapel Hill shooting, and a rise in anti-Muslim hate crimes. I recognise the theme of ‘us versus them’ and it scares me.

American Sikhs mourning the loss of two Sikh who were gunned down in a hate crime

So the question we should be asking is, where does this hate for Islam stem from and how has it developed so rapidly? When we take a closer look we can see how the spreading of anti-Muslim sentiment may have started and who helped it along the way. In an interview with DemocracyNow! Yasmine Taeb, co-author of Fear, Inc. 2.0: The Islamophobia Network’s Efforts to Manufacture Hate in America discusses the “Islamophobia network” and its successful attempts to dehumanise Muslims and spread false information about Islam as a religion, going on to explain “This is how the Islamophobia network operates. A group of foundations and donors provides the money—to date, more than $57 million. That money is given to a selection of tightly knit organizations that rely heavily on a handful of so-called experts that orchestrate misinformation about Islam. That misinformation then spreads to a larger network of activists, politicians, media and more, creating an echo chamber around the false idea that Islam is a violent religion.”

Meanwhile, the media goes on dispersing negative ideas about Islam, showing violence and war in Muslim countries without context, portraying Muslims as violent people who can’t or won’t be helped, and at the same time neglecting to cover the atrocities committed by other religious extremists. For example, Western media outlets have completely downplayed and basically dismissed the humanitarian crisis in Burma, where Rohingya Muslims are being killed by the masses. Furthermore, columnists and scholars are routinely interviewed by CNN and Fox News on how the West should be wary of Islam. At the same time minority voices are quieted, and Muslim scholars and analysts who have something to say against blind hate are without a prominent platform to do so.

Vigil for the victims of the Chapel Hill shooting

Some news personalities have even gone as far as to claim that it is the Muslim community’s responsibility to end terrorism committed by Al- Qaeda or ISIL, leaving viewers with a sense that there’s no difference between ordinary people who practice Islam and Islamist extremists or terrorists. What these news personalities forget to mention is that groups like Al-Qaeda and ISIL kill more Muslims than non-Muslims and the majority of Muslims condemn these attacks as much as anyone else.

Three innocent students are dead, and the world didn’t even blink. Propaganda blatantly continues to corrupt our societies, and the people who should be held accountable are dismissed. Instead of information, we’re being fed ignorance. The consequences of which are deadly. As Muslim rights advocate, Dr. Elmasry puts it, “-what if acts of anti-Muslim violence are consistent with at least some strands of current western ideology? What if Islamophobia has become so commonplace, so accepted, that it now represents a hegemonic system of thought, at least for relatively large pockets of people in some regions of the West?”. Seemingly, no amount of American flag stickers can bridge the gap that’s formed between Western societies and Muslim communities. It’s time for a discussion to be had.

By Naseem Garcha

Image credit:

Picture 1: Joe Catron, licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

Picture 2: jasleen_kaur, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

Picture 3: mschierbecker, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

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