/=-=-=-=-Click Here & Support Our Sponsor-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=/ Calculate Your Way to Better Shape! Use our Free E-Tools to Find Out if You're Overweight, How to Eat Better and How to Burn More Calories Click Here and Find Out Instantly! http://click.topica.com/aaabpDbz8SnrbAjwjxa/WebMD \=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=/ __________________________________________________________________________ The Internet Anti-Fascist: Friday, 9 February 2001 Vol. 5, Number 9 (#511) __________________________________________________________________________ Action Alerts: European-wide Action Week Against Racism 17-25 Mar 01 ad hoc group of anarchists in Kiev, "Anarchists Of Kiev Deny Their Implication Into Attack On Tent Camp of 'Ukraine Without Kuchma' Campaign," 7 Feb 01 Crimes Against Humanity In Old Virginnie Chris Kahn (AP), "Va. Lower House OKs Bill on Eugenics," 2 Feb 01 Book/Movie Reviews: Alastair Macdonald (Reuters), "'Sexy' Stalingrad Epic Opens Berlin Film Festival," 7 Feb 01 Rightwing Crime In the News: Reuters, "German Teen Skinheads Jailed for Vagrant Murder," 2 Feb 01 Jocelyn Gecker (AP), "Holocaust Survivors Protest Papon," 4 Feb 01 Kristen Hays (AP), "Cross-Burner Sentenced to 10 Years," 5 Feb 01 ABC News, "'Columbine-Style' Attack Averted: Police in Kansas have arrested three teens in connection with a planned attack on a local high school. Police say they found weapons, ammo and Nazi and white supremacist materials along with a floor plan of the school," 6 Feb 01 What's Worth Checking: 10 stories -------------------------------------------------------------------------- ACTION ALERTS: UNITED is preparing an updated list of activities in the framework of the European-wide Action Week Against Racism 17-25 March 2001. For those who are preparing meetings, demonstrations, exhibitions or festivals campaign posters are available. Please send your activity to UNITED, to be included in the list of activities which will be distributed to over 2000 addresses around Europe. Use the list to: find partners, find speakers, organise international solidarity actions... We plan the following activities: Title Date Theme Place Name organisation Address Contact person <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> - - - - - Anarchists Of Kiev Deny Their Implication Into Attack On Tent Camp of 'Ukraine Without Kuchma' Campaign ad hoc group of anarchists in Kiev 7 Feb 01 At yesterday’s action "Ukraine without Kuchma" [Leonid Kuchma is Ukraine's president, protests in Kiev are organized by a wide range of oppositionists including Stalinists and nationalists] in the center of Kiev, some several dozens unknown young men waving black flags with anarchist symbols attacked the action participants’ tent camp. According to media reports, they belong to some "Syndicate of anarchists". The attack was appraised as provocation by action’s organisers and some media representatives; meanwhile the large part of reports claimed the attackers as "anarchists" or "people who claimed themselves the anarchists". We, Kiev anarchists from different initiative groups and NGOs, participating in public actions in Kiev at different periods, have to state that we have never heard on organisation or group with the name "Syndicate of anarchists"; no information on such organisation’s activity ever came; and no one of the people (those of them with non-covered faces which it was possible to scan) who attacked the tent camp on February 6, 2001 ever participated in the activity of the Kiev anarchist community. We also affirm that none of anarchist organisations known to us either condemned or supported "Ukraine without Kuchma" action, while some people from Kiev anarchists community sometimes participated in it. We consider the attack happened as ugly and brutal provocation against participants of "Ukraine without Kuchma" action. Such a provocation against anti-president tent camp, while committed with anarchist flags, is absurd, which can be used only for research on mental capabilities of those who will believe it. However, the whole style of such actions is quite familiar. The very same silent young men in standard clothes, with faces that hard to remember, used the violence while detained Kiev anarchists at legal manifestation in 1997 or during protests against EBRD meeting in 1998. Now the very similar people tried to hide their real attributes behind the quickly made symbols of those who became the object of the same violent actions some times before. We condemn the provocation that took place at February 6, 2001 and claim the state security bodies responsible for it. Kiev anarchists: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> -------------------------------------------------------------------------- CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY IN OLD VIRGINNIE Va. Lower House OKs Bill on Eugenics Chris Kahn (AP) 2 Feb 01 RICHMOND, Va. -- The state's lower house passed a resolution Friday expressing regret for the forced sterilizations of about 8,000 people since the 1920s when the state embraced the phony science of eugenics. The bill, which passed through the House of Delegates by an 85-10 vote and now goes to the Senate, did not include the word "apology." The bill's sponsor, Mitchell Van Yahres, said he decided to strike the word before the vote. "The word 'apology' draws fire," he said. "It carries a connotation of guilt that I don't want to be associated with." The final bill expressed lawmakers' "profound regret over the Commonwealth's role in the eugenics movement in this country." Virginia and 29 other states sterilized more than 60,000 people against their will during the American eugenics movement. In 1924, Virginia lawmakers permitted involuntary sterilization and made it illegal for whites to marry non-whites. Proponents of eugenics thought they could purify the white race by targeting people they considered "feebleminded," including the mentally ill, mentally retarded, alcoholic or immoral. Virginia's law was upheld in 1927 by the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites), and influenced the eugenics movement worldwide. The Nazis, who forcibly sterilized 2 million people, utilized German law that echoed the Virginia statute. Eugenics was eventually discredited as political and social prejudice, but the last eugenics language was not removed from Virginia's law until 1979. Van Yahres said it is important to face the past now because of recent advances in genetic engineering. "We don't want to go down that road again, when we were compared with the Nazis and the Holocaust," he said. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- BOOK/MOVIE REVIEWS: 'Sexy' Stalingrad Epic Opens Berlin Film Festival Alastair Macdonald (Reuters) 7 Feb 01 BERLIN -- A German-made multinational blockbuster about the battle of Stalingrad launches the Berlin film festival Wednesday into 12 manic movie days with stars and producers pushing their claims to next month's Oscars. "Enemy at the Gates" features Britain's Jude Law and American Ed Harris as dueling Russian and German snipers in fear of winter ice and each other in the crucial conflict of World War Two. Widely reported to have cost some $80 million, it premieres as one of the most expensive films ever made in Germany. Filmed at former East Germany's old Babelsberg studios outside Berlin, the two-hour epic directed by Frenchman Jean-Jacques Annaud is touted as heralding a revival in commercial movie-making in Europe and the end of the Hollywood monopoly. Annaud, best known for "The Name of the Rose" and "Seven Years in Tibet," has injected some unlikely Hollywood-style love interest into the grim tale of war and death in the form of Rachel Weisz as a Russian woman soldier. Some critics have questioned the ethics of weaving fiction around the grim historical truth of a battle that claimed a million lives in 1942-43 -- at least one historian argues tales of sniper duels were products of the Soviet propaganda machine. But the producers clearly believe the stalwart 20th century war movie genre, with a liberal dose of sex, still has a future. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- RIGHTWING CRIME IN THE NEWS German Teen Skinheads Jailed for Vagrant Murder Reuters 2 Feb 01 SCHWERIN, Germany -- Three teenage German skinheads received prison sentences of three to 12 years for the brutal killing of a homeless man last summer, a court official in the east German town of Schwerin said on Friday. The sentences fell short of those sought by prosecutors, who wanted terms up to life imprisonment for one of the defendants for beating to death the sleeping 51 year-old vagrant. The three attackers on trial were aged between 16 and 19. The trial of a 24 year-old alleged to be the main assailant has been delayed so that he can undergo psychological testing. The incident, in the Baltic Sea resort island of Usedom, attracted substantial attention in Germany, following a spate of anti-Semitic and racist attacks. Under pressure to react to a reported rise in far-right violence, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's government has moved to ban the National Democratic Party (NPD), a some 6,000-strong grouping it sees as a breeding ground for neo-Nazi violence. - - - - - Holocaust Survivors Protest Papon Jocelyn Gecker (AP) 4 Feb 01 PARIS -- Some 200 Holocaust survivors and members of Jewish groups gathered outside a Paris prison Sunday and said former Vichy official Maurice Papon should remain behind bars despite the old age and declining health his lawyers say are cause for his release. The peaceful protest came amid a fierce debate in France over the fate of Papon, 90, who is serving a 10-year jail term for crimes against humanity for his role in deporting French Jews to Nazi death camps. "Papon killed, assassinated and tortured," said 74-year old Judith Pachtovez, who said many of her relatives died in the Holocaust. "He's alive. He's eating. How dare he say his penalty is too severe." Papon's lawyers asked the European Court of Human Rights last month to order his release. They say he is oldest man in a French prison and that a 10-year sentence is inhuman punishment for someone his age. The European court recently agreed to speed up its hearing of Papon's appeal, and public debate in France intensified when a Jewish politician, former Justice Minister Robert Badinter, said he should be freed. Papon was convicted in 1998 for his role in the arrest and deportation of 1,500 Jews while he was police supervisor in the Gironde region of southwestern France. He fled to Switzerland after the conviction but was subsequently arrested and began serving his sentence in Paris' La Sante prison in October 1999. Papon had triple coronary bypass several years ago and had a pacemaker implanted last January. Memorial plaques to some of those deported to death camps under Papon's command - aged from 5 months to 88 years old - were leaned against the prison's stone walls Sunday. "We are here to recall the memory of the elderly, of women and of infants who were deported by Maurice Papon in spite of their age," said Patrick Klugman, vice president of the Union of Jewish Students of France. Yves Kamami, president of B'nai B'rith France, said it would be "inhumane" to release Papon. "Mr. Papon has expressed no regret, no remorse and no justification for what he did," Kamami said. "It is imperative to not let Mr. Papon out." - - - - - Cross-Burner Sentenced to 10 Years Kristen Hays (AP) 5 Feb 01 HOUSTON -- The leader of a group of five Texas men who burned a cross in front of a black family's home was sentenced Monday to 10 years in prison. Matthew Marshall, 21, was the last of the group to be sentenced. All pleaded guilty to violating the civil rights of Dwayne and Maria Ross and their two children last summer in Katy, a Houston suburb. The family found a charred 6-foot cross on their lawn on June 19, a day celebrated by Texas African-Americans and known as Juneteenth. It marks the date President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation abolishing slavery first became known to slaves in the state. Prior to his sentencing, Marshall pleaded for leniency, telling the family the cross-burning was not "personal." "I did not even know your name," he said. "It was not about hate, because I am not a racist." Marshall asked Judge David Hittner for probation or a term in boot camp rather than a prison sentence. But Hittner said he was unmoved, and ignored pleas from friends and family who called Marshall's behavior an aberration. Hittner also said Marshall had once dragged a dog to its death and that the FBI (news - web sites) had a videotape showing Marshall force-feeding a feces-laced sandwich to a Native American high school classmate. He said racial slurs used by Marshall's father during a pre-trial hearing had influenced his decision. "It appears that the seeds of his racism were sown at home," Hittner said. Three of Marshall's co-conspirators were sentenced to just more than a year in prison while the fourth was sentenced to more than three years in jail. Marshall's lawyers said drugs and alcohol were to blame. - - - - - 'Columbine-Style' Attack Averted: Police in Kansas have arrested three teens in connection with a planned attack on a local high school. Police say they found weapons, ammo and Nazi and white supremacist materials along with a floor plan of the school ABC News 6 Feb 01 Three Kansas teens are in jail after police uncovered plans for a "Columbine-style" massacre at a local high school.Police say they found firearms including a modified assault rifle, 400 rounds of ammunition, bomb-making materials, bomb "recipe" books and computer discs and a hand- drawn floor plan of the Royal Valley High School in Hoyt, Kans., which the trio attended. They also found white supremacist and Nazi drawings, police said. Also taken from the homes were three black trench coats eerily similar to those worn by the two Columbine High School gunmen, who belonged to a group known as the "Trench Coat Mafia." 'Nothing Short of Columbine' Police are convinced they averted a massacre. "I would guess it would be nothing short of what happened at Columbine" Chief Detective Steven Rupert of the Jackson County Sheriff's Department told the Topeka Capital-Journal. The three were allegedly made bombs with Fourth of July fireworks and pipe bombs with fertilizer, Rupert told the newspaper. He also said they made "relatively harmless" dry ice bombs. "We don't know how serious they were. We can't delve into their minds. We just couldn't wait," he told the Capital-Journal. Rupert guessed the three wanted to pull off a Columbine-style attack at a major school function, such as a dance. Columbine students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed themselves and 13 others at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., in April 1999. Trio Kept to Themselves Richard Bradley Jr., 18, of Hoyt Kansas was charged with conspiracy to commit murder, and faces other charges. Two juveniles, aged 16 and 17, are facing charges of conspiring to use explosives and other charges, and one is facing charges of witness intimidation. The three were arrested on Friday, police said on Monday. The three kept mostly to themselves in this northeast Kansas community as they plotted the massacre, police said. A student who witnessed the three building and detonating explosives told a school official, who told police, officials said. After interviewing the student, police obtained search warrants for two of the suspects' homes, where the items were found. Royal Valley High School has about 300 students. Last week, police in California arrested Al DeGuzman, 19, for allegedly plotting a similar attack on De Anza College in Cupertino, Calif. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- WHAT'S WORTH CHECKING stories via <ftp://ftp.nyct.net/pub/users/tallpaul/publish/story7/> AP, "Thousands Protest Austria Government," 3 Feb 01, "Thousands of people marched through downtown Vienna Saturday to protest the government that was formed a year ago and includes the far-right Freedom Party." <2081.txt> David Bailey (Reuters), "Convention Seeks Plan for U.S. Slavery Reparations," 3 Feb 01, "The African-American community must develop a unified plan to push for reparations from the United States for the descendants of African-American slaves, leaders meeting in Chicago said on Saturday. ... Advocates of reparations believe that compensation is owed for the unpaid labor of slaves as well as other forms of institutional racism." <2082.txt> Reuters, "Einstein, Freud on Swiss Bank Holocaust List," 5 Feb 01, "Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud appeared on a list of some 21,000 dormant accounts judged most likely to have belonged to Holocaust victims that was published by Swiss banks on Monday. Swiss bank officials were unable to say whether the famed German-born physicist and the Austrian founder of psychoanalysis were in fact the account holders or if the names were just coincidence." <2083.txt> Nicholas K. Geranios (AP), "Idaho Turns Hostile for Neo-Nazis," 6 Feb 01, "Like his hero Adolf Hitler, Richard Butler finds himself besieged on all sides. The founder of the neo-Nazi group Aryan Nations is losing his home and some of his followers after being bankrupted by a civil rights lawsuit. No lawyer will represent him. Someone threw a rock through the stained- glass swastikas of his abandoned chapel. Butler couldn't even rent a motel room to hold services of his white supremacist religion. The evangelist of hate now finds himself in the position of complaining about discrimination." <2084.txt> Nicole Winfield (AP), "U.N. Conference To Deal With Racism," 7 Feb 01, "Anti-immigrant sentiment in Europe. Race relations in America. Ethnic conflict in Africa and the plight of the world's indigenous peoples. These issues and more will be on the table at an upcoming U.N. conference on racism and intolerance that the top U.N. human rights official said Tuesday could produce a 'magna carta' for victims of discrimination." <2085.txt> John Schwartz (New York Times), "In Tapping the Net, the F.B.I. Insists Privacy Is Not a Victim," 8 Feb 01, "As long as there have been law enforcement agents, they have tried to listen in on what the bad guys are planning. In early times, that meant standing next to a window in the evesdrope, the place where water from the eaves drips, to overhear conversations. ... The Internet, in turn, has provided new frontiers for law enforcement tappers. At first, surveillance of Internet traffic was useful only in hacking cases — after all, only geeks were online. But as the world has gone digital, criminals have as well, and Internet taps are requested in a growing number of cases." <2086.txt> Bruce Lincoln (Caroline E. Haskell Professor of History of Religions at the University of Chicago), "Dubya, defender of the faith: What's Behind the Faith-Based Initiative?" 8 Feb 01, "You have to give W. credit. He doesn't comport himself like someone who lost the popular vote by half a million and needed all his father's horses and all his father's men, not to mention five eminences noires, to boost him into the Oval Office. Some people would walk softly under the circumstances, but Texans are made of sterner stuff. Besides, he has debts to pay. Among the largest is to the religious right, which rescued him in South Carolina when his campaign faltered, and brought him more (and more highly committed) workers, donors, and voters than any other group. The horse they backed won, if lamely and barely, and it's time to cash in their chits. Typically, this involves a healthy feed at the federal trough, but in this case First Amendment concerns pose inconvenient obstacles. What's a fellow to do?" <2087.txt> Reuters, "Colombian Policeman Held in Death Squad Attack," 8 Feb 01, "A Colombian police captain has been arrested in connection with the attempted murder of a union leader by a paramilitary death squad late last year, a police general said on Wednesday. Police Gen. Alfonso Leon Arellano told local television that the officer had been arrested over the attack last December on Wilson Borja, head of Colombia's 700,000-strong public sector workers' union." <2088.txt> Jeff Glasser (U.S. News & WOrld Report), "Death penalty reforms: Illinois issues new rules to clean up the process," 5 Feb 01, "The defendant's brief laid out in devastating detail Illinois's sorry record on the death penalty. By March 1998, nine former death row inmates had proved their innocence. Now another was trying to overturn his conviction. 'Innocent people are being sentenced to death," Illinois Supreme Court Justice Moses Harrison -- who until then had generally upheld the death penalty -- warned in a scathing dissent. "When there have been so many mistakes in such a short span of time . . . the only conclusion I can draw is that the system does not work as the Constitution requires it to'." <2089.txt> Nick Cohen (The [London] Observer), "Beware the Mod Plod: Government plans would let armed Ministry of Defence Police patrol the streets -- A case of more spinned against than spinning," 4 Feb 01, "That perenially speculative visitor from Mars could have looked at Britain on New Year's Day 2001 and concluded that the country was enjoying a rare period of tranquillity. Crime had been falling for years. Unemployment was close to a million, a blessing those whose lives were stunted by Margaret Thatcher thought they would never witness. The supermarkets provided all varieties of bread. Television was a perpetual circus. Admittedly there were blights which appeared insoluble - global warming, astonishing inequality and Midweek with Libby Purves - but against them could be set the benefits of peace and prosperity. Britain had no external enemy who might invade her territory. The unending Irish conflict had settled into a fractious stalemate. It scarcely seemed the moment to impose military control on civilian life." <2090.txt> * * * * * In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. __________________________________________________________________________ FASCISM: We have no ethical right to forgive, no historical right to forget. 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