Category Archives: Bulletin Board

Gathering in the Shadows of a Nuclear Winter

Conference

Saturday Sept 9, 2017 Rm. 1700 SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings St, Vancouver, BC (Unceded Musqueam, Sqamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Territories)

“no mouse would ever construct a mousetrap.” Albert Einstein

There is an urgent need to attend to the crisis of the nuclear threat in the world today. 2017 began with the Doomsday Clock being set forward by 30 seconds to two-and-a-half minutes to midnight. Currently both the US and Russia are expanding their arsenals and new players are entering the field. Donald Trump’s statements have increased the threat of nuclear proliferation. One hundred and twenty countries met at the UN on March 27 to push for a ban on nuclear weapons though the nuclear-armed nations led by the US refused to participate.

The principle of “Mutually Assured Destruction,” with the apt acronym of MAD, which has been the basis of human security since the Soviet Union challenged the US monopoly of terror in 1948 has been destabilized by the current US superiority in first strike capability. The answering Russian progress in the development of hypersonic missiles only accelerates the race toward destruction. Within this global situation the escalating militarism of nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, locked in hostility since birth in 1947 and engaged in daily border skirmishes poses an imminent danger. Apart from the increasingly shrill rhetoric of nationalism in both countries, there is evidence that India is reconsidering its policy of No First Strike, about which Pakistan has always been deeply skeptical in any case.

There is also the growing concern that the logic of development and the demands of climate change will lead to greater dependence on nuclear power plants, whose benign promise is belied by the disasters at Chernobyl and Fukushima. India is moving rapidly in this direction despite protests from from environmentalists and people living in the coastal areas.

The goal of the conference is to focus on the existential threat facing us by bringing together in conversation nuclear scientists, scholars, writers, and anti-nuclear and peace activists from India, Pakistan, Canada, and the US The purpose of the conference is to situate the extremely dangerous nuclear stand-off and hostility between India and Pakistan within the global concern with militarism and the nuclear threat, to address the dubious value of nuclear power as an answer to climate change, and to contribute to developing people’s initiative for peace and sustainable development.

Organized by South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD) with generous financial Support from Dr. Hari Sharma Foundation and Institute for the Humanities, Simon Fraser University. Co-sponsored by Committee of Progressive Pakistani Canadians (CPPC)and School for International Studies, SFU.

Admission is free but registration required. RSVP Chin Banerjee, cbanerjee@telus.net

Lunch will be provided for presenter and organizers. Others who wish to share catered lunch should send cheque for $10.00 to SANSAD at 906-608 Belmont Street, New Westminster, BC V3M 0G8.

PROGRAM

September 9: Room 1700 SFU Harbour Centre

9.30 AM: Welcome

9.45 AM: Rap music by Jovian Radheshwar

10.00 AM – 1.00 PM: Session 1: Moderator: John Hariss. Presenters: Admiral Ramdas, Lalita Ramdas: “The UN Treaty: Nuclear Haves and Have-nots … What Next?”; M V Ramana, “Nuclear Energy and Nuclear Disarmament: Can the two co-exist?”; Sirish Rao, Wanpovi Kathy Wan Povi Sanchez,”What we do to mother earth we add to our soul wounding”.

1.00 PM -2.00PM: Lunch

2.00 PM: Music Sejal Lal

2.15 – 5.00 PM: Session 2: Moderator: Sid Shniad. Presenters: Pervez Hoodbhoy: “Nuclear Instability in South Asia”; Robert Anderson; Annie Ross: “They have taken our Land and used it to destroy the rest of the World”; Paul Meyer: “The Nuclear Weapons Prohibition Treaty and the pursuit of Nuclear Disarmament”; Derrick O’Keefe.

PARTICIPANT PROFILES

John Harriss is Professor of International Studies at Simon Fraser University. He was Director of the School for International Studies from 2006 until 2013 and again in 2016.

Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy is currently Zohra and Z.Z.Ahmad Distinguished Professor of Physics and Mathematics at Forman Christian College, Lahore, having taught for 44 years at Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad. He graduated from MIT with a Ph.D in nuclear physics. In 1968 he won the Baker Award for Electronics, and in 1984 the Abdus Salam Prize for Mathematics. In 2003 he was awarded UNESCO’s Kalinga Prize for the popularization of science. In 2010 he received the Joseph A. Burton Award from the American Physical Society and the Jean Meyer Award from Tufts University. In 2011, he was included in the list of 100 most influential global thinkers by Foreign Policy magazine. In 2013, he was made a member of the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Board on Disarmament Affairs, a position he currently holds.

Paul Meyer is Adjunct Professor of International Studies and Fellow in International Security at Simon Fraser University and a Senior Fellow with The Simons Foundation Vancouver. Prior to assuming his current appointments in 2011, Paul had a 35 year diplomatic career with Canada’s Foreign Service, including serving as Canada’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN and the Conference on Disarmament, Geneva (2003-2007). He teaches diplomacy at SFU’s School for International Studies, and his research interests include nuclear arms control and disarmament, outer space security and international cyber security.

Jovian Radheshwar is a rap artist, poet and recording artist.

Born in Bombay and raised in New York, Jovian taught Black Studies and Political Science in Santa Barbara, California. His musical inspirations include Outkast, Nas and Pink Floyd. He currently lives in Vancouver where he teaches Political Science at Douglas College. Jovian finds in rap a powerful medium for making a statement both personally and politically.

As MC Bitter Buffalo on the album “No Hooks” (2012), Jovian collaborated with Bobby Musgrave (Pensive Blue Polar Bear) and Ed Keenan (DJ California Condor) in exploring the endangered nature of existence in a technologized modern world. As part of the Endangered Species collective, he performed shows in Santa Barbara, Isla Vista, Goleta, and Los Angeles, California.

Admiral Laxminarayan Ramdas was commissioned in the Indian Navy in 1953, trained as a Communication Specialist at the Royal Naval Staff College, UK, and headed the naval academy at Kochi. He was prominently engaged in the Indo-Pak war of 1971. He received Vir Chakra, Param Vishist Seva Medal, Ati Vishisht Seva Medal, and Vishisht Seva Medal. He was the Chief of Naval Staff of the Indian Navy from 1990 till his retirement in 1993. Since his retirement he has been deeply engaged in anti-nuclear, peace, social justice, and democratic rights issues. He received the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 2004 for his work on denuclearization and demilitarization of South Asia. He is in the forefront of the movement for peace between India and Pakistan. He is a member of the Citzens Whistleblowers Forum (CWF) formed in February 2017 to track corruption.

Lalita Ramdas is an activist in women’s rights, particularly women’s education, environmental issues, peace, Indo-Pak friendship and denuclearization. She is one of the founding members of Greenpeace India and has served as Chairperson of Greenpeace International from 2007 to 2010. She launched the Rainbow Warrior II in 2011. She has worked as an informal educator in the slums of Delhi and founded “Ankur”, a society for alternative education. She was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize as one of “1000 Peace Women” in 2005.

M. V. Ramana is the Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, University of British Columbia and the author of The Power of Promise: Examining Nuclear Energy in India (Penguin Books, 2012) and co-editor of Prisoners of the Nuclear Dream (Orient Longman, 2003). He is a member of the International Panel on Fissile Materials and the Global Council of Abolition 2000. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Leo Szilard Award from the American Physical Society.

Annie Ross is an Indigenous (Maya) teacher and artist working along and with community in Canada. She teaches Environmental Ethics in First Nations Studies at Simon Fraser University.

Elder Kathy Wan Povi Sanchez MA., is an activist/ organizer who believes in beloved communities in the transformative culture of peace . Her activism on nuclear non-proliferation, human rights, and the rights of our Mother Earth, brings spirit-rooted awareness into environmental justice advocacy and policy changes to end violence against women, girls and Mother Earth. She is currently the Environmental Health and Justice program manager for Tewa Women United, NM USA www,tewawomenunited.org

Sid Shniad is a lifelong social justice activist who spent most of his working life as a trade union researcher at the Telecommunications Workers Union. He has been active in the anti-war movement and is a founding member of Independent Jewish Voices Canada (www.ijv.ca), an organization dedicated to justice for Palestine, where he is currently a member of the national steering committee.

SANSAD mourns Hassan Gardezi

July 1, 2017Statements/News ReleasesSANSAD

The following resolution was adopted at the SANSAD AGM on June 24, 2017:

We deeply mourn the passing of our dear friend and comrade Hassan Gardezi in April this year and wholeheartedly endorse the following obituary penned by Zahid Makhdoom:

DR. HASSAN NAWAZ GARDEZI

(19 February 1933 – 20 April 2017)

It is with extreme sorrow, the Committee of Progressive-Pakistani Canadians (CPPC), announce the passing of Dr. Hassan Nawaz Gardezi, one of the founding members of the CPPC. He truly had remained a lifelong and a tireless activist for justice, peace, secularism, and socialism, a huge inspiration to its members, friends, and associates. Death of a human being is always a sad affair. Somehow death of an individual always creates big craters in the lives of those who survive to see another day. But, when a person of such an intellectual and academic presence and stature, like Professor Gardezi, leaves from our midst the void left is simply impossible to bridge, the sorrow that follows exacts an enormous toll, the scars of the loss become indelible. Although his loss is impossible to even fathom, his contributions shall forever live to produce a universe of possibilities, a pathway to a just and a fair society.

Professor Gardezi had taught sociology to several cohorts in the reputable Canadian, American, and Pakistani universities. A large number of his students went on to become professors, journalists, writers, judges, lawyers, trade unionists. Many developed and maintained a lifelong relationship with him and his thoughtful spouse, Rosalie Gardezi. Whether in Pakistan or in Ontario or any place else that the Gardezis lived, their home was always a meeting place where intellectuals, activists, mandarins, and bohemians congregated. Lively discussions and debates were always welcomed. Hassan and Rosalie’s calming presence and amazing hospitality was a constant at these events.

After his retirement from being the head of the Department of Sociology at Algoma University at Sault Ste. Marie, Dr. Gardezi and Rosalie moved to Peterborough, Ontario. The choice of Peterborough was logical to them as their children were attending at the nearby universities. During his years of retirement, Hassan, maintained an exemplary life of an intellectual. Publishing regularly, attending and presenting papers at international conferences, engaging in activism for justice, peace, secularism, and socialism. He also wrote beautiful poems in his first language, Siraiki. He translated some classic Sufi tracts from the Siraiki language into the English language. His two-volume biography of Dada Amir Haider Khan, a leader of the Communist Party of India, presents a remarkable account of the emancipatory movements in the colonized South Asia and their nexus with the workers and peasant movements throughout the world.

As a visionary, Hassan always encouraged younger comrades and friends to organize. He indeed played a big part in organization of numerous organisations and associations struggling for just, fair, and peaceful society. Indeed, Hassan was instrumental in the organization of the CPPC. His vision is reflected in the mission of the CPPC. While we are still struggling to cope with the loss of this remarkable person, we continue to bask in the light of his vision, his compassionate and thoughtful fellowship and friendship, his unfathomable wisdom and generosity. Our hearts are with Rosalie and their beautiful children. May we all and may the Gardezis find peace.

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Call to unite against fascism in India

June 28, 2017Statements/News ReleasesSANSAD

SANSAD News-release, June 28, 2017

Unite against progressing fascism in India

The following resolution was adopted at SANSAD AGM June 24, 2017 and is being issued as a news release on June 28 in solidarity with “Not In My Name” rallies being held in Delhi and several other cities across India as well as London, Toronto, Boston, and Karachi:

Whereas the renowned social scientist and historian Partha Chatterjee recently stated that in Kashmir, India is witnessing its General Dwyer moment given the similarity between the British army’s justifications of its mass killings in Punjab in 1919 and the Indian army’s defense of its actions in Kashmir today,

and whereas within India as a whole today there is a similar moment of Kristallnacht, the night of broken glass in Nazi Germany as the lynching of Ambedakarite Dalits and Muslims are normalised as everyday events and ordinary people desensitized as spectators,

and whereas since the coming to power of the present Hindu-fascist RSS led BJP Government in 2014 there has been an unrelenting attack on Ambedakarite student and youth movements, left and progressive political formations and Muslim minorities in general that stand in Hindutva’s way to discard the Indian constitution and turn India into a Hindu Rashtra,

and whereas India is on the verge of a fascist takeover, with innumerable vigilante squads operating with impunity all over India under various names and organizing programmed spontaneity of mob violence against Muslim and Dalits, especially in states ruled by the BJP,

Therefore be it resolved that we call on networks of Ambedkarite Dalits, progressive people and persecuted religious minorities of South Asian origin in North America to organize against the fascist Hindutva takeover of the Indian state and in support of civil society organizations, academics, cultural groups, artists and activists in India who are resisting this murderous regime and its genocidal agenda.

South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD): www.sansad.org

Uphold independence and freedom of press

June 17, 2017Statements/News ReleasesSANSAD

SANSAD News-release June 8, 2017

Uphold the Independence and freedom of the Press

South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD) condemns the Central Bureau of Investigation raid on the offices of NDTV and the residence of its owners in and around New Delhi on June 4 as a blatant politically motivated attempt to intimidate and silence its independent and critical voice. NDTV is one of the most respected and influential media outlets in India, and one of the very few such voices left in an increasingly gloomy mediascape. The current raid is the latest of a series of episodes of harassment faced by NDTV, which the government had tried to shut down for 24 hours in 2016 as punishment for its coverage of the terrorist attack on the military base in Pathankot.

Journalism in India is in a state of acute crisis. Most of the mainstream media is owned by a small number of corporate houses whose owners are also intimately connected with the ruling BJP and the government of Narendra Modi. Indeed, NDTV too is indebted to Mukesh Ambani, the richest man in India and owner of Reliance corporation, and has promoted the interests of the BJP and the multinational, Vedanta. Such corporate and political domination ensures that the media presents the official narrative of the party and the government without question and has established hyper-nationalism as hegemonic. Any dissent is branded “anti-national” , with the cry taken up by an increasingly mobilized section of the populace affiliated with the party or its various social forms who hound the culprit on social media or attempt to silence her/him with physical violence. In addition, any media attempting to cast a critical eye on the government and its friends is branded “Presstitute” by the ruling politicians and their supporters bringing the media into disrepute. Since Modi’s coming to power in 2014 it has become almost impossible to expose manipulated data and opaque government operations. This is the background against which the President of India recently affirmed in an important speech to journalists that discussion and dissention were essential to a vibrant democracy and public institutions had to be held accountable for all their actions and inactions.

India has 406 news channels in various languages and tens of thousands of newspapers and magazines. Yet this year it has fallen 3 places to 136th among 180 countries ranked in the World Press Freedom Index compiled by Reporters Without Borders, which places India below Afghanistan and United Arab Emirates. This is not surprising given the Hindu nationalist’s rampage to cleanse India of all “anti-nationalist” thought, as a result of which in 2014 at least 114 journalists were attacked, with only 32 attackers arrested, and between January 2016 and April 2017 there have been 54 attacks reported though the actual number is much higher since many attacks are unreported because of threats from politicians, police, and the vigilantes.

We, members of the South Asian diaspora in Canada stand in solidarity with the many brave people of India fighting for democracy against fascistic developments and with the courageous journalists and independent media engaged in the struggle for press freedom, which is the bedrock of all democracy. We applaud the declaration of NDTV that it will fight all attempts to bully it. We demand that the government of India stop using the institutions of the state to attack the freedom of the press and take appropriate action against those who use violence to silence critical voices.