As another Banned Books Week wraps up in this country and the cultural focus shifts to the next designated week for the next cause, word comes of two tragic world events related to the free flow of information.
Eric Silver at the Independent reports that “The manager of Gaza’s only Christian bookshop, who was abducted on Saturday by suspected Muslim extremists, was found dead yesterday.”
The bookseller Rami Ayyad, was 31 years old and leaves behind two children and a wife who is pregnant. “About 3,000 Arab Christians live among 1.4 million Muslims in the Gaza Strip. Attacks on Christians and their property are rare, but more than 40 video cassette shops and internet cafes, identified with Western values, have been bombed in the past year.”
Testimony to the fact that the world is not, contrary to the the Bush Adminstration’s mantra, a safer place.
Bloomberg is reporting that human rights organizations are calling for the release of Maung Thura, “Myanmar’s (formerly known as Burma) best-known political satirist, film star and poet.” There is concern that he has been tortured since his arrest last week. Thura, who goes by the name Zargana, has along with other artists and writers who have also been detained, been providing food and provisions to the Buddhist monks who have been peacefully protesting the country’s repressive regime.
The censorship machine is in full force along with the military crackdown. Internet restrictions, mass arrests, torture. There are reports that up to 200 people have been killed and as many as 6,000 people are being detained, including thousands of monks who led the rallies. Remember this is the same regime that came to power “after crushing a 1988 pro-democracy uprising by killing as many as 3,000 people.”
Why wouldn’t they kill that many people again to keep power? Let’s not watch this one happen.