Afghans want nonviolent options for the People, options to end the war

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDI5wc56dHo

No other options for the People?

Is fighting and killing the best method humankind can come up with to control fighting and killing?

Who says so?

The People of Afghanistan are tired of war as a method for ‘peace’, and they want options.

They want nonviolent options, options to live without killing, options to end the war.

“We wish to live without wars.

We do not want the ‘Taliban’ or the ‘Al-Qaeda’ to rule us.

We do not want the current corrupt Afghan government or war-and-drug-lords to rule us.

We do not want neighboring and regional countries to rule us.

We do not want the US/NATO forces to rule us, far less to over-stay permanently or kill us!”

Abdulai, and the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers

Afghans, with the ordinary People of the Middle East and Africa, want an end to their endless, tiring wars.

It is clear that war, the systematic en-masse killing of fellow human beings, is nonsensical as a method to control fighting motivated by hate, anger and inequity of basic human needs. War cannot control hate, anger or inequities.

It is clear that many political and religious leaders remain entrenched in war as a method of Wealth and Power, their self-comforting propaganda being that war is somehow a method approved by Governments or Gods to counter ‘evil’.

It is clear that the ordinary People of the world no longer believe the propaganda. Which conscientious soul, American or otherwise, still believes that the Iraq war was waged for ‘Iraqi freedom’? The barrier People face in turning their resilience into action is their fear of what the Powers can do to harm them.

That fear is dissipating across the Middle East.

To clearly demand the People’s human right to decent livelihoods of genuine peace, we observe ( and this is not our imagination ) that People everywhere are awakening and arising to end the unquestioned, violent Power of the Governments or the Gods.

Thomas Pickering and Lakhdar Brahimi, David Milliband and surely more ‘experts’ to follow in the days to come, have proposed a negotiated political settlement as an ‘endgame’ in Afghanistan.

The problem for the People is that today’s politics cannot be separated from militarism, and it has become one and the same to speak of civil-military solutions, an approach which the United States of America has amply emphasised and ‘normalized’ in Afghanistan.

The problem for the People is that prize-grabbing political negotiations are just as ruthless as military solutions, thrashed out by an elite huddle of unquestioned, violent Powers in expensive conferences, all wheeling and dealing for their strategic interests in nice-looking cloaks.

In such negotiations, as always, the People will remain the silenced, beheaded goats of a global ‘buzkashi’, the modern Great Game ( ‘buzkashi’ means ‘pulling at the goat’, an Afghan game in which horse-riders grab at and drag a killed goat to their victorious target bases ).

How would the People find decent livelihoods from such violent Power games, if the People mattered at all? Violent Powers have never represented the needs of the People of Afghanistan.

The Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers would like to invite Thomas Pickering, Lakhdar Brahimi, David Milliband or any other Afghan or world leader to live among the People, to experience the ‘untenable life’ that ICRC described on 12^th of March 2011, to pant under the stress of having ‘ Nowhere to Turn ’ ( a November 2010 report in which Oxfam and 28 other NGOs described the current day-to-day, night-to-night failure to protect Afghan civilians).

And while Thomas Pickering, Lakhdar Brahimi, David Milliband and their likes live with the People in their Afghan mud-house villages, they can ‘helplessly’ watch their fate as the Violent Powers of the Karzai government, the Taliban and their Pakistani associates and the US/NATO Generals negotiate on how to divide the ‘goat-people’. If the villages that Thomas Pickering, Lakhdar Brahimi and David Milliband were living in got brokered into the delighted hands of an Afghan drug-warlord, Talibanic or otherwise, what would Thomas Pickering, Lakhdar Brahimi, David Milliband do? What would you do?

The past few centuries of human wars have pushed the masses who are being killed to extreme fatigue, not to mention pushing the masses to an unsustainable life of indecent inequality. This extreme fatigue took some hopeful resolution after World War II in the United Nations Charter and Declaration of Human Rights, but because the Powers propagated a system of economic ( unfettered capitalism etc ) and political ( unfettered militarism etc ) policies and international relations which is dominated by unquestioned Violent Power, the fatigue and inequality heaped on the masses found ‘resignation’ in the ‘what-to-lose terrorism’ or ‘what-to-do apathy’ of today.

Our world needs healing from this fatigue and inequality and it cannot come from existing military or political Powers. Healing doesn’t come from the Disease.

These military or political Violent Powers persuade our souls by selling us their ‘democracy or theocracy’, ‘left or right ideals’ and ‘conservative or progressive aims’, all claiming ‘peace and stability’ as the goals of their crowning self-interests.

The People of Afghanistan, the Middle East and Wisconsin have seen through the endless ‘endgames’ of the Powers, and will have none of it.

We need a different way, a fresh way in international relations.

The Age of the Powers in the haughty hands and voices of a few is collapsing.

The Age of the People in the meek hands and voices of the masses is growing.

The Powers can no longer demean the People by portraying the human masses as stupid, evil beasts incapable of better choices, because People everywhere want their freedom and sovereignty and are capable of living and loving.

Ordinary People everywhere want options, nonviolent options for the People, options to end the wars that are killing them.

Because the world hasn’t clearly heard what the ordinary People of Afghanistan want, please listen again!

The ordinary people of Afghanistan wish to live without wars.

The ordinary people of Afghanistan do not want the ‘Taliban’ or the ‘Al-Qaeda’ to rule them.

They do not want the current corrupt Afghan government or war-and-drug-lords to rule them.

They do not want neighboring and regional countries to rule them.

They do not want the US/NATO forces to rule them, far less to over-stay permanently or kill them!

So we say to all..

Stop sending our killers your glittery money.

Stop sending our killers your jittery weapons.

Stop sending our killers your wealthy politicians.

Stop forcing on us NO OTHER OPTIONS, making us ‘resign’ to the least bad of the equally Violent Powers, all of whom we do  not want ; the Taliban, the corrupt Afghan government & drug-warlords, the regional powerbrokers and the US/NATO coalition forces.

If your local town has seen the death and destruction that soldiers and leaders from more than 50 countries separately or in coalition have brought over 30 years, which one person would you trust?

Trust.

Love.

To other young people in Afghanistan and the world, we wish to confess that we, the youth who make up the majority of the Afghan population, are finding it hard to trust anyone. Consistent, fatal betrayals make it hard. But should we give up on the love and truth that we believe exists in humanity? Does giving up make life any easier or any more meaningful? We’ve agonized over this, and feel that the least we can try to do is to steer away. When global convention appears ‘sold out’ to the violent acquisition of wealth and power, we can steer away. We can refuse.

We refuse all who wage war on the People for their selfish Power and Wealth.

We refuse the method of war.

Afghans want options, nonviolent options for the People, options to live without killing, options to end the war.

And if you still do not understand or connect with our very human hopes and dreams, we want you to know that we have never acted to harm you in any way, and that to live and die decently, we want our personal, independent space.

Sincerely,

Hakim and the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers

Further thoughts

In case you think that we are a bunch of young, naive ‘idealists’, we will persist in peaceful walks, in planting trees, in keeping vigils, in building relations across all ethnic groups and borders, in developing our peace parks and in working with our own hands.

In case you think that the People of Afghanistan and fellow People around the world do not have other options, here’s an outline of one of many possibilities.

We humbly suggest a NONVIOLENT APPROACH to resolve the human conflict and humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan.

This NONVIOLENT APPROACH is premised on a commitment to the well-being of the People and to non-killing.

We suggest the appointment of an INTERNATIONAL MEDIATION TEAM, an independent, neutral, non-partisan, volunteer, ( we cannot over-emphasize the importance of having individuals who are beholden to none except humanity, and please don’t tell us that such people do not exist ) ‘blue-scarf’ civilian team of mediators that would work with but not under the United Nations in :

1. Reaching an accord for all armed local and foreign groups to cease their killings, an Accord to cease killings as a method to resolve the Afghan conflict.
2. Mediating on behalf of the People of Afghanistan for the interests of the People. All of the people of Afghanistan have to right to live as independent communities within a sovereign nation. The international mediation team would mediate between ALL Afghan groups, regional-country groups including Pakistan and Iran, and US/NATO countries, and this would include mediating for  Afghans to be given the rights of independent, sovereign communities.
3. Establishing an international transitional peacekeeping force that will maintain the cessation of war, while determining definite timelines for the complete, responsible withdrawal of all foreign troops from Afghanistan. The presence of foreign military in Saudi Arabia was one reason Osama Bin Laden gave for the September 11^th attacks, so this mistake must not be repeated in Afghanistan.
4. Establishing a humanitarian and livelihood crises team to provide essential services and employment through independent, interdependent and indigenous systems, thus respecting and meeting the demands of the ordinary people of Afghanistan to have decent independent lives, an independence and dignity which excludes all foreign interference but includes equal relations with all nations.
5. Enabling civil society groups to deliberately organize an Afghan national Consensus and Unity Campaign, across all Afghan ethnic communities in all provinces, including through peace education classes in all institutions of learning. This needs to have the intentionality and intensity of a national campaign. Such a campaign has never happened. The consensus will serve as a guide to establishing fresh socioeconomic relationships among Afghan communities and forging shared values and rules of law.  It will be also used as a guide to formulating future policies of local governance committed to the expressed interests of the People, in structurally and socially overcoming the poverty, corruption, distrust, oppression and nepotism prevalent in the war-torn Afghan society of today.
6. Establishing a locally-appropriate means of restorative justice, an element of which includes meeting the People’s minimum demand for all those involved in past killings to apologize and NOT seek further positions of leadership or power.
7. Removing privileges and unquestioned power and wealth from the systems of governance, and implementing reforms for the equitable, transparent and sustainable use and accounting of community and national resources.
8. Holding ‘clean’ local level elections to choose ‘clean’ representatives, representatives who have no involvement in any killings in the past and who are not known to be corrupt, as is expected in the Islamic or any faith. The representatives will be chosen for positions that do not confer any special privileges or wealth.

We have offered some far from comprehensive suggestions, confident that humanity is capable of many other creative, nonviolent ways, confident that we all wish for the days and nights when we can finally live without wars.

International Peace Delegation to Afghanistan Spring 2011

We are grateful to all the Afghan civil society groups, academic groups and Afghan leaders we had met over the past 3 weeks in Kabul, as well as the 26 international peacemakers from America, Australia and Germany who had visited us. The international peacemakers who visited us in Kabul were :

Mary Lou Anderson   — Las Vegas, Nevada

Patricia Chaffee – Racine, Wisconsin

Stephen Clemens – Minneapolis, Minnesota

Mary Dean – Chicago, IL

Elizabeth Deligio –  Chicago, Illinois

Christopher Doucot –  Hartford, Connecticut

Detlef Enge-Bastien, M.D. – Germany

Christine Gaunt – Des Moines, Iowa

Peggy Gish – Athens, Ohio

James Haber – Las Vegas, Nevada

Martha Hennessey – Perkinsville, Vermont

Judith Kelly – Washington, D.C.

Kathleen Kelly – Chicago, Illinois

Patrick Kennelly  – Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Ceylon Mooney – Memphis, Tennessee

Simon Moyle – Australia

Donna Mulhearn  Springwood, New South Wales Australia

James P. Noonan – Washington, D.C.

Jake Olzen  — Chicago, Illinois

Martin Reusch – Springwood, New South Wales, Australia

Scott Schaeffer-Duffy  — Worcester, Massachussetts

David Swanson –  Charlottesville, Virginia

John Volkening  — Chicago, Illinois

Paki Wieland –  Northampton, Massachussetts

Kathleen D. Kerwin – Florida

Please see some related articles to our actions and activities over the past month below :

Afghans Call for Peace: ‘One Blue Sky Above Us’ by Kathy Kelly

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/03/18-0

Peace is a Dirty Word by Patrick Kennelly

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/03/19-7

Killing Civilians in Afghanistan is Terrorism by Patrick Kennelly

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/03/24-1

Face to face with Afghanistan and a war we cannot win by Simon Moyle

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/45794.html

http://kabulpeacediaries.wordpress.com/

Pilgrim in Kabul by Donna Mulhearn

www.pilgriminkabul.wordpress.com

Jim Haber and Mary Lou’s Afghan updates

http://nevadadesertexperience.org/issues/2011/afghanistan.htm

An Afghan Peace Movement, Not a U.S. Peace Jirga By David Swanson

http://www.truth-out.org/afghan-peace-movement-not-us-peace-jirga/1302246000

US Congressman Keith Ellison assured Steve Clemens that he would deliver ‘Reconciliation of Civil Hearts’ peace message from the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers to President Obama

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xL4Px5FodvE

Fatima of Afghans for Peace urges fellow Afghans to protest

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYoo-b1qXx0

Jan Viklund’s Afghan Spring International Delegation Listens

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmCTPYj6CXw

Our peace walk in Kabul on March the 17^th 2011, accompanied by Afghan riot police

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uedQzWck7xc

Our tree planting on March 19^th 2011 at a private school in Kabul

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xzcw9rA1mrc

Our candle vigil and reconciliation efforts

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDI5wc56dHo

The AYPVs with the international delegation

Reconciliation of Civil Hearts 2011 ( downloadable on our website )

In October 2009, we kept a Peace Vigil under a tarpaulin tent for 7 days and nights, wanting our message ‘Reconciliation of Civil Hearts’ to be heard. The US Ambassador to Afghanistan Karl Eikenberry popped by for a chance visit! US Ambassador Eikenberry’s visit to the Afghan peace vigil youth http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTHbY-obupI

The Ambassador exchanged promises with Zekerullah, one of the vigiling volunteers. Zekerullah promised to return to school, a promise he fulfilled in the spring of 2010. The Ambassador promised that he would deliver our message to President Obama, but we have not yet heard any news of its successful delivery.Zekerullah fulfills his promise to Ambassador Eikenberry & President Obama http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEnUU4hCVoo

One of our Spring 2011 international peace delegates, Stephen Clemens, had kindly delivered our message to Representative Keith Ellison, who promised to deliver it the President Obama’s office. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xL4Px5FodvE

We hope that reconciliation will come to Afghanistan and the world, soon. Our candle vigil and reconciliation efforts

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDI5wc56dHo

Afghan Youth Write Letter: “Please Stop Killing Us”

Reconciliation of Civil Hearts: The ordinary voice of peace from Afghanistan

http://warisacrime.org/node/57336

http://gandhitoday.org/pdf/afg-stopkill.pdf

Poems from two of our dear friends

Why not love?

By Larry Kerschner

An audacious suggestion in the midst of war.

Why not love?

With love there would be no

bleeding in the country.

There would be no harm to the children.

This is not some foreign voice

that we cannot understand.

Love is listening.

How has that place in us become so empty?

Why is death easier to talk about

than love?

The taste of love has never changed.

There must be a way home from here.

At what hour of the night

can ignorance melt into pools of light?

Why not now?

Why not love?

I Cannot Hear the River Singing

By David Smith Ferri

March, 2011

Eleven-year-old Hemad speaks

I

We left our village together in the dark

stars thick overhead.

Ten of us

all from the same village

following ancient footpaths

climbing along creeks into the mountains.

A thin blanket of silence lay over the Pech Valley

the only sounds feet and hooves crunching

our breath puffing.

II

We didn’t know ourselves apart from that silence

and the vast spaces our mountains held in their hands

and a limitless sky above

leaning over us like a mother.

III

We’d known each other since before memory.

We liked being together.

In the mounting uncertainty of life in our village,

it was a comfort.

IV

Unarmed, leading our donkeys along the path,

we could not be mistaken for bandits, thieves, militants.

No one could see us for anything but what we were,

a group of boys awoken before dawn

and forced out under the stars by poverty and cold.

V

We’d done this hundreds of times.

Every rock and plant knew us.

In an ancient language,

the river sang songs of water locked in ice

and sunshine setting it free,

of Afghanistan’s past and future,

and we thought we heard it murmur our names.

At night, as we slept,

these were the waters that invaded our dreams

and carried us away.

VI

But that day in early March

something else came to carry us away.

Something the music of the waters could not defend against.

A threat even its magic could not diffuse.

VII

Arriving, we spread out like a hand over the mountainside.

Like fingers we combed the ravines,

bending and rising

foraging for sticks and branches

and piling them.

We trusted the trees and the soil.

We leaned against rocks to eat our lunch

and lay on the bare ground to nap.

VIII

We had come back together and were preparing to leave

when the helicopters flew overhead

and hovered above us.

Two of them,

so loud they drowned the sound of the water.

We looked up

and before the bullets struck us,

before the missiles tore through trees and exploded,

an instant before my friends were shredded and scattered like paper,

we saw a green flash.

It was the last light they saw.

Now it is the light I wake to in the morning

and the last thing I see at night.

And I cannot hear the river

singing.

Text of video

I lit this candle for my own father ( killed in war )

We lit these candles for children who’ve been killed in the Gaza, Iraq & Afghan wars

We light these candles for all the war victims of Afghanistan

in particular for our brother Ihsanullah, son of Subhanullah, who was 11 years old

We want options, nonviolent options for the People…

We refuse all violent power.

We refuse the violent Power of the Taliban.

We refuse the violent Power of the Afghan government & drug-warlords.

We refuse the violent Power of all regional countries.

We refuse the violent Power of the US/NATO coalition.

We refuse all who wage war on the People for selfish Power & Wealth.

So we say to you…

We said to the Head of UN Ban Ki Moon through his Afghanistan Director of Communications Kieran Dwyer

We said to President Obama through US Congressman Keith Ellison

This is a letter from Hakim & the Afghan Youth Peace Volunteers

This scarf was worn by the 40 young people marching in the streets of Kabul calling for nonviolent solutions in Afg

I will assure you that I will move that letter to President Obama, to his office. I’ll take personal care of it

For the grief & prayers of all Afghan mothers, stop the killings!

Afghans want options, nonviolent options for the People, to live without killing, to end the war.

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