January 12, 2001
JAMAICANS UNITED AGAINST POLICE BRUTALITY BRITISH GOVERNMENT LIFTS BAN ON GUNS TO JAMAICA POLICE FORCE Dear Friends, The British government has decided to lift its ban on weapons to the Jamaica Constabulary Force, thereby exposing the hollowness of its supposed concern about human rights in Jamaica. The ban was imposed last year because of questions raised about the high homicide rate of the JCF and fears that these weapons would be used against the people. Within the past week Dr. Marjorie Mowlam, the visiting British Minister for the Cabinet Office and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, gave a rather disingenuous reason as to why the ban was lifted. "There was some concern across the water in London about human rights but I think now there is training going on in the Jamaican Constabulary on not just policing but human rights. By the time the guns arrive everyone who is using the guns will have human rights training." Any school boy or girl knows that being trained and actually respecting human rights are two different things. Police recruits have always been taught concepts of human rights but what does it matter when brutal police method is state policy. A more genuine way to test the way in which this so-called human rights training made a difference would have been to allow time for evaluation especially since the police killed such an excessive number of people in November and December. We can only conclude that the British government hastily ended the ban because they were never sincere in the first place. Undoubtedly, the lobbying of the Jamaican government and surely that of the gun manufacturers in Britain played a part in the decision thereby exposing what these forces all have in common – a commitment to preserving state terror throughout the world. How else does one explain the fact that the British Government, in association with the United States, have over the past eighteen months dropped some 400 tons of bombs and missiles on a defenseless Iraq, killing hundreds of civilians and destroying homes, and wreaking havoc on the country's already bombed out infrastructure. In October, for example, American officials told the Wall Street Journal they would soon be running out of targets -- ‘We're down to the last outhouse.' The US state department, like the British government, issues yearly reports criticizing Jamaica's human rights record and the practice of police extra-judicial killings, but has never raised the question of sanctions. Without the threat of sanctions the Jamaican government has little incentive to do something about police killings. In addition to encouraging and supporting those in Jamaica who are carrying forward the fight against police brutality and state abuse of basic human rights, we repeat that calling for an international boycott of Jamaica's tourist industry in the best contribution that the international community can make to the struggle against police killings in Jamaica. Jamaicans United Against Police Brutality pledges that the year 2001 will be decisive in terms of taking the next step forward. COLIN POWELL IS NO HERO Finally, we would like to add our support of the position taken by Gleaner columnist Cecil Gutzmore, that Colin Powell, son of Jamaican immigrants to the US is no hero. Colin Powell led US forces in the destruction of Panama City and the killing of hundreds and perhaps thousands of people in pursuit of one man, Manuel Noreiga, a former crony of then President, and former CIA director, George Bush. Colin Powell also led the criminal assault against the Iraqi people and in a cowardly fashion US forces killed thousands of Iraqi soldiers as they scampered home at the end of the war. This is the hallmark of a war criminal not a hero. Lloyd D'Aguilar
COLIN POWELL IS NO HERO THE EDITOR, Madam: CONGRATULATIONS TO [Gleaner columnist] Mr. Cecil Gutzmore for his insightful look at Colin Powell in his Monday article "What manner of man is this". It is very rare to find unemotional objective criticism particularly when it concerns the rise of one of our own, regardless of the dishonourable company kept and the blood spilt in attaining such lofty heights. Colin Powell is no hero of black people much less Jamaican people. His 'heroic' career slaughtering Third World people and his admitted political manoeuvrings in Washington's power corridors were not done in our interest. Our insistence on seeing him through idealised eyes only attest to our myopia and tunnel vision. Surely if he is our hero so too are Reagan, Bush, Thatcher and all those who stand with them in the belief that "Might is Right". If his autobiography is to be relied on then globalisation, the New World Order, Manifest Destiny, and the Munroe Doctrine are all noble goals to consume one's life and energies. What our choice of 'hero' says about us is particularly interesting. Firstly it says we are racist and nationalistic. Were Mr. Powell white American we would denounce him as a warmonger or at best ignore him. Secondly it says we are supremely insecure. Insecure in that we yearn to have validation of ourselves by America, so much so, that we will uncritically accept the heroes it fashions for us. Thanks again Mr. Gutzmore for daring to be that voice of sanity in a land where being such appears to be criminal. I am etc., MARK WHITE
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