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Myanmars ruling military threatened on Friday to arrest citizens who invested in bonds offered by a shadow government, warning of lengthy prison sentences for their involvement in what it called terrorist financing.

The National Unity Government (NUG), an alliance of pro-democracy groups, ethnic minority armies and remnants of the civilian government overthrown by the military, said this week it had raised $9.5m in the first 24 hours of its bonds sale.

The NUG says the proceeds from the zero-interest bonds will fund its revolution against the military in response to its February 1 coup and bloody suppression of protests. It has not said how the funds would be used.

Zaw Min Tun, the junta's spokesperson, said the NUG has been outlawed as a terrorist organisation, so those providing funding faced serious charges.

Action can be taken under terrorism charges with heavy sentences for those financing the terrorist groups, he told a regular televised news conference

If you buy the money bonds, it falls under that [provision].

Myanmar has been in turmoil since the coup, which led to strikes and protests and a severe military crackdown on activists. It also led to the formation in several regions of militia forces allied with the NUG, some backed by armed ethnic groups.

More than 1,200 civilians have been killed in protests and thousands detained since the coup, according to activists cited by the UN.

International pressure on the junta is intense.

The regional Association of Southeast Asian Nations blocked junta leader Min Aung Hlaing from a summit meeting in October over his failure to cease hostilities, allow humanitarian access and start dialogue, as agreed with the group.

US President Joe Biden, who addressed the summit, also rebuked the regime.

The bonds went on sale on Monday to mainly Myanmar nationals overseas in denominations of $100, $500, $1,000 and $5,000, with two-year tenures.

The NUG did not disclose how many buyers took part in the sale, which requires participants to transfer funds to an account in the Czech Republic.

Reuters

Originally posted here:
Myanmar will arrest those who buy bonds issued by pro-democracy group - Business Day

Credit...Matthew Monteith for The New York Times

To the Editor:

Re Living My Life Again, by Katharine Esty (Opinion guest essay, Sunday Review, Nov. 21):

Dr. Esty, who is 87, put her social life on hold for most of the pandemic, but now she goes out often, plans to attend parties and has been to several restaurants.

Although I, too, am elderly 88 my life is different. I havent received any invitations to parties and havent been inside a restaurant for over a year. I, too, had a boyfriend, but he died a few years ago. We went to restaurants together so enjoyable! and did a lot of traveling, some of it quite adventurous, but those years are the stuff of nostalgia, not present-day reality.

I think that Dr. Esty could be a little more humble about the vicissitudes of aging. Yes, of course we should all try to make the best of our situations in life, but illness can stop us dead or almost dead in our tracks. She seems a bit judgmental toward her fellow elders who succumb to fatigue, anxiety and creaky joints. She, on the other hand, pulls herself up by her bootstraps and lives every day to the fullest.

To give her credit, she wants to set a good example. Fair enough. But lets bear in mind that getting old sometimes seems like a conspiracy against our intentions no matter how deeply held to stay strong and master every challenge.

Nancy C. AtwoodCambridge, Mass.

To the Editor:

Dr. Katharine Esty has the right idea. I am 85 and my wife is 80. I work out six times a week at my local gym, and I teach mathematics at Fordham University. We are fully vaccinated, including boosters.

We eat out in restaurants about five times a week, visit our children and grandchildren, who are all vaccinated, and go out with our few remaining friends whenever we can. We have few years left, and we would be fools to spend them as prisoners in our house.

Incidentally, we have no intention of moving anywhere. We will die where we have lived for the past 51 years in the house that we had built for us where we raised our children and stored our memories.

Jack WagnerNew Rochelle, N.Y.

The term was used by Fareed Zakaria in Foreign Affairs in 1997 (The Rise of Illiberal Democracy) and was popularized by Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary to describe his regime.

Let us give that oxymoron a well-deserved rest. Suppression of human rights, repression of the press and government manipulation of elections bear not the slightest resemblance to any form of democracy. Illiberal democracy is not democracy; it is dictatorship pure and simple.

And its perpetrators are not merely authoritarians or autocrats; they are dictators.

Mark BernkopfArlington, Va.

To the Editor:

Re How the Pandemic Worsened the Housing Crisis in the Bronx (news article, Nov. 17):

As the primary housing legal services provider in the Bronx, we have seen firsthand how the pandemic has intensified the economic inequalities in the borough and pushed already vulnerable tenants deeper into housing instability.

Bronx residents need meaningful policy solutions to thwart the risk of homelessness should the statewide eviction moratorium expire in January.

There are two key bills pending in Albany that would provide robust tenant protections for Bronxites.

First, the Good Cause eviction bill, budget-neutral legislation, would protect renters in non-rent-stabilized units from baseless evictions and exorbitant rent increases. Good Cause has already been enacted in multiple localities across the state, and support continues to grow.

Another bill, the Housing Access Voucher Program, would provide vouchers to homeless families, facilitating their transition from shelters into stable housing. New York should fully fund this program to the tune of $1 billion to meet demand.

Our clients in the Bronx deserve these common-sense protections from what could be a tsunami of evictions in 2022, and Albany must act now.

Adriene HolderNew YorkThe writer is attorney-in-charge of the civil practice at The Legal Aid Society.

To the Editor:

In Whats the Matter With Scarsdale? (The Morning Newsletter, nytimes.com, Nov. 4), David Leonhardt suggests that affluent voters who support tax increases are voting against their economic interests as much as working-class voters do when they oppose those same increases. This line of argument defines the meaning of economic interest too narrowly.

Affluent voters who support more social services often do so because they understand that inequality and poverty are bad for everyone. Unequal societies have been shown to have more anxiety, less economic growth and greater political instability. It is thus in everyones economic and political interest to have more egalitarian societies. Some rich people will have fewer excess goods, but thats a small price to pay for a decent and stable world.

The real issue is that the shared interests of the affluent few and the less affluent many are perpetually blocked by a political and economic elite who continue to pit us against one another. Until this elite is either rejected by a nonviolent social movement or manages to recognize that they, too, will be better off in a more equal world, we will continue on the path of our fractured politics.

Avram AlpertPrinceton, N.J.

Excerpt from:
Opinion | In Their 80s, and Living It Up (or Not) - The New York Times

We go a long way, Ms Samantha Power, you and us. We remember you for denouncing your countrys (USA) government falsehood of avowing ignorance to what was happening in Rwanda in 1994 as the Genocide against the Tutsi.

When you penned Bystanders to Genocide, that was some research youd done there, friend. And we gave you thumbs up. Not so much that we cared for those governments looking the other way while our country burnt, despite their pledged Never Again, since only Rwandans could perceive the intrigues that had led there, as that they should appreciate this fact of only the affected party comprehending it and thus giving us space to repair the breakage.

Well, dear friend, they didnt and, to-date, they havent.

But what makes you different today is that you seem to have joined them. Like them, you go scattering allegations around about societies that are minding their own business without thinking twice of, let alone doing research on, your assertions. What happened to your knack for inquiry, for research? Has superpower politics gone to your head, too?

When you say of Rwanda and I quote: I dont think there is an environment on the ground that allows criticism or that there is pluralistic party development or the criteria that you would have in any textbook for a liberal democracy, Ms Power, these are serious claims about a society.

These no environment that allows., no political space. and other coinages that mean little but are the fad in the West in connection with third world governments, how are you magically able to assess them? If there were galaxies of political space. in these countries, how would you, in your air conditioned office, be able to see them or feel their effect?

Because if criticism in some societies is not the kind that Id call fracas criticism thats in your political culture, you must admit you may not recognise it. There are societies where criticism does not involve hurling insults, breaking property in streets or engaging in other such dishonourable conduct.

But of course, we know what you mean. Like opinion-pushers of your ilk, you are pleading for the fugitives on the loose in your countries, where they enjoy liberal favours. Well, here genocide outlaws and thieving renegades belong to the courts of law. Thats where their fates are determined. If guilty, they must suffer their punishment. When innocent, they are as free as the air we breathe.

Pluralistic party development here is alive and well. Only, its not the kind that you want: one involving those outlaws in exile. For as long as they are wedded to their vision of division, exclusion and elimination of compatriots, theyll never have a place in this country.

The currently practicing nine political parties agree on this. They also agree that their common denominator is the quest for socio-economic transformation. So, old friend, put your heart at ease.

Improved living standards for all citizens are the crux of democracy in this country. Democracy does not spring from any textbook, no, Madam. Its not a lifeless, bloodless and breathless collection of abstractions. Its a living, breathing, feeling and life-giving being.

And its not that its not yet mature, no. Its that its organic, that its evolving and always will. Itll always grow and respond to circumstances, contexts, changes and others according to how the wishes, desires and values of the citizenry are or will be at any one particular stretch of time.

For this and other reasons, every day adds a letter in the paragraph of the Rwandan textbook on liberal democracy. Its not a textbook that can be put on the shelf for occasional reference visits.

But even as its a book in progress, it must at all times be predicated on the solidity of the noblest of values. Thats why the most important pillar in this book is communication.

Communication among all citizens; among the led; among the leaders; between the led and the leaders; among those in the private sector; in the civil society. In short, communication all round.

With the right to life and liberty ensured, all must be empowered to have an equal voice and so benefit from inclusiveness and equality, which demand for good livelihood, health, habitation, etc., for all. An atmosphere of accountability and transparency ensures these are absolute rights.

It also goes without saying that the aforesaid mean ensured freedom of assembly, of association, of speech. And for all this to happen, all must enjoy peace, security and the rule of law.

We do not dabble in criticism of other countries as we are busy building our own. But think on it, dear friend: a homeless person folded up on the street. Police kneeing life out of a black. An innocent black coming out of a 55-year prison sentence. In this 21st century? Beggars belief!

Ms Power, is it in the land of your birth, Great Britain, where they cautioned us thus? Before worrying about a speck in your friends eye, check in case you have a log in your own.

The views expressed in thisarticle are of the writer.

Link:
Those berating us on democracy, is there no log in your eye? - The New Times

In 2017, about six women were killed intentionally by people they knew every hour. Of the 87,000 women killed that year, fewer than half were killed by strangers. Femicide takes different forms, and different concepts are used around the world. But while the differences between femicide and feminicidio, for example, are not merely linguistic but also cultural, there is some agreement on significant key elements. Generally, femicide refers to the killing of women and girls because they are females, i.e. because of their gender. These killings result from unequal power structures rooted in traditional gender roles, customs, and mindsets. And they are the tip of the iceberg in terms of gender-based violence against women and girls.

Given this dire state of affairs, it is painful to consider that some men are trying to justify their hate and violence against women. Shortly after a 22-year-old gunman murdered five people on the streets of Plymouth in the UK, news reports emerged linking him to the obscure, largely-online incel movement. Women are arrogant and entitled beyond belief, the killer had posted on social media shortly before the attack, describing himself as bitter and jealous and seemingly confirming his allegiance to the movement.

The incel ideology is based on the concept of involuntary celibacy the idea that certain physical, biological, social, and mental characteristics prevent men from having access to some kind of sexual marketplace. That marketplace, they claim, is dominated by so-called Chads and Stacys, who exclude incels from participating. The result is an embittered community of male forum-dwellers who perceive themselves as social outcasts and turn their ire primarily against women, but also men and romantic couples. Unlike most acts of femicide, many incels do not attack women they know in line with broader terrorist targeting preferences, the victims are typically randomly selected.

Misogyny, and sexual frustration, is certainly a key part of the movement and the ideology.

On the complex domestic extremism and terrorism stage, incels occupy a curious space. They do not appear to pose the same threat as white supremacists or Salafi-jihadists, yet they inflame fear and intense discussion. And their often-bizarre creed transcends assumed ideological boundaries. A far-right extremist who attacked a synagogue and kebab shop in Germany, for instance, repeated several tropes common in incel chatrooms. But regardless of how we understand them ideologically, violent elements of the movement retain a threat of terrorism against Western communities.

Firstly, its important to note that 2020 and 2021 were bad years for incel violence. Most lethal, of course, was the Plymouth attack, which killed five, but incidents in the US and Canada also claimed victims and provided reminders of the threat to North America. The most serious US case was one Arizona-based incel that opened fire at a mall in Glendale in May 2020 to kill couples. Three people were wounded. In Toronto, a teenager wascharged with a terrorist crime after killing a woman at a massage parlour. And in Virginia, an individual blew his hand off building a bomb.

Counterterrorism analysts often reference the nexus between intent and capability where they meet, terrorism is inevitable. With incels, intent often outpaces capability, and the only reasons the violence has not been worse or more visible these past two years isincompetence on the part of the attackers and good policing but, crucially, not a lack of intent. As long as intent persists, we are at threat.

Secondly, profound pandemic-related concerns about radicalisation to extremism may prove disproportionately true in the case of incels. Experts are concerned that the same troubles weve all experienced during the pandemic isolation, loneliness, boredom, and too much time spent online will feed extremism. The reason the pandemic is so dangerous forincelradicalisation specifically is because, unlike with other extremist movements, those factors are actually part of the ideology itself.

Incels are radicalised online, and they talk incessantly about a lack of friends and romantic prospects, about spending day after day at home alone, and about trouble in school or finding work. Misogyny, and sexual frustration, is certainly a key part of the movement and the ideology. But we must also recognise that incel ideology is self-reinforcing. And those feelings, emotions, and conditions that lead incels into radicalisation have only intensified during the pandemic. Already, most acts of incel violence have been murder-suicides like in Plymouth, violent incels primarily aim to end their own lives, while maximising the number they take with them.

Thirdly, were seeing an expansion to Europe. Most incel violence has been contained to North America, but multiple arrests in Scotland and England were followed by the tragedy in Plymouth, while Germany and Italy have also witnessed incels mobilising towards violence. Incels represent the ultimate case study in an ongoing trend in terrorism, in which movements previously assumed to exist purely domestically have instead crossed oceans and borders, accelerating along social media tentacles to radicalise newcomers in new countries. This makes them far more difficult to challenge, as they evade any traditional conceptualisations employed by national counterterrorism agencies. And this trend may intensify. There is nothing inherently Western about incel ideology that would prevent it from expanding further, for instance, to Asia.

We face a male supremacist movement producing extremists who are as emboldened to attack as ever.

Fourthly, incels have attracted a lot of media and counterterrorism attention, but there are other misogynist movements that are just as dangerous and that we risk ignoring with too much focus on incels. The clearest example is the Atlanta shooting earlier this year, during which women were targeted at multiple Asian-majority spas. The attacker was not an incel but similarly combined deeply personal, sexual grievances with an ideology that justified violence against an outgroup, which in this case also included a racial dimension. The importance of tackling broader misogyny and male supremacism at large (including the myriad forms of femicide worldwide) should not be missed while our focus is on incels.

There are ongoing debates about the countering of this movement, and about efforts to combat it as a terrorist ideology. Canada, in particular, has led the charge to classifyincelviolence as terrorism, inspiring passionate debate on the topic. The US appears to be following suit, but far more cautiously. This is one of the major questions in efforts to counter incel violence: does calling it terrorism help or hurt?

Those questions are complicated by the fact that not all acts of incel-inspired violence involve equal ideological components. Here, Plymouth provides a worthwhile case study. The first recognised incel attack, which targeted a sorority house in Isla Vista, California, involved a gunman who published a manifesto and videos directly claiming credit for his attack and linking it to the ideology. Plymouth did not. The word terrorism and the legal ramifications that might accompany it should be reserved for ideological violence that clearly targets a defined outgroup and aims to spread psychological fear a standard that does not fit every act of violence linked to incels, including the attack in Plymouth, but certainly does meet some.

In any case, we face a male supremacist movement producing extremists who are as emboldened to attack as ever, will benefit from the pandemic, are expanding to Europe, and are actually just one of many male supremacist subsects. On the post-Covid-19 counterterrorism stage, then, incels may play a leading role.

Go here to see the original:
The incel threat Democracy and society - IPS Journal

One year before Americans got embroiled in an ugly debate about the validity of the 2020 election results, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts unleashed a warning flare about threats to U.S. democracy.

We have come to take democracy for granted, and civic education has fallen by the wayside, Roberts wrote in his 2019 year-end report on the federal judiciary. In our age, when social media can instantly spread rumor and false information on a grand scale, the publics need to understand our government, and the protections it provides, is ever more vital.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Court Judge John Tunheim will deliver a speech in Minneapolis that lays out how the creation of two Minnesota Justice & Democracy Centers will address the problem that Roberts diagnosed.

In an extended interview with Twin Cities Business, Tunheim explained how the centers will fill a gap in civics education and why children and adults need to pay more attention to understanding their government and restoring respect for democratic institutions. He also talked about why its essential for the business sector to be able to operate within a functioning democracy.

The first center is expected to open next year in the federal courthouse in downtown St. Paul, and the second center will be inaugurated a year later in the federal courthouse in Minneapolis.

The primary reason for doing this is to create a place for school children to come in on field trips with their teachers and learn about the Constitution, to learn about voting, to learn about major cases, to learn about the judiciary, and the importance of judicial independence, said Tunheim, who has been chief judge of the U.S. District Court of Minnesota since 2015.

President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, nominated Tunheim for a federal judgeship in 1995. President George W. Bush, a Republican, nominated Roberts in 2005 to become chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Both men were confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

While presidents from two political parties selected Tunheim and Roberts for pivotal roles in the federal judiciary, they share strong, common views about the need to buttress civics education and build trust in democratic institutions.

Tackling a civic education deficit

In recent years, Tunheim said, spending on STEM education has greatly increased, which is a good development for U.S. competitiveness. But he said another trend has had a negative impact on the nation. Weve disinvested from education in history, and particularly civics and education about our democratic institutions, the judge said.

That civics deficit is why Chief Justice Roberts encouraged federal courts to become partners with schools in increasing knowledge about government.

At noon Tuesday, Tunheim will be the featured speaker at the Westminster Town Hall Forum in downtown Minneapolis. One outgrowth of neglected civics education among the young people of our country is that many students cannot even name the three branches of government, Tunheim said.

In addition to explaining why the new Justice & Democracy Centers are needed, Tunheim said he will talk about what they will offer, and what we hope to inspire and hope to make a difference in the community fabric of Minnesota.

The St. Paul center will be 1,360 square feet, and the Minneapolis center will be larger at 2,850 square feet. Structural building of the centersflooring and wallswill be covered by federal funds.

It will cost about $1.5 million to create exhibits and install technology in the two centers, according to Rebeccah Parks, public information officer for the U.S. District Court. The court is not allowed to raise money for those expenses. Park said leaders of the Minnesota chapter of the Federal Bar Association are soliciting contributions from businesses, foundations, and other community sources to help support the exhibits and other center costs.

School trips to the centers likely will be taken by students in grades four through nine, although nobody will be excluded from the centers.

Were going to populate [each center] with interactive screens that help students understand the Constitution, court cases, and how a case proceeds through the judicial system, Tunheim said. There also are plans to make a film about government that students can watch during their visits.

In conjunction with center visits, Tunheim said, he hopes that students can also enter actual courtrooms. He noted that it would be valuable for students to watch a real judicial proceeding, and then spend a little time with a judge, so they get a chance to meet a judge, and talk to a judge and ask their questions.

Almanac creators leadership role

Bill Hanley, who led the creation of TPTs long-running Almanac program, is working closely with Tunheim on the start up and programming of the two centers. Earlier this year, he became the executive content officer for the centers.

For many years, Hanley was executive vice president of Minnesota production at TPT, which brought him into contact with judges. In particular, hes proud of the TPT documentaries that examined how people with developmental disabilities were affected by the legal environment.

As I was leaving TPT, it just began to bug me that the court is so essential, it is so crucial, and yet it continues to be the one branch of government that is misunderstood, Hanley said.

Hanley met with Tunheim to explore ways the court could be more visible in community settings, and he helped coordinate a 2019 naturalization ceremony at Allianz Field in St. Paul that Tunheim presided over.

Everybodys got their own definition of justice, but justice under the law means something, Hanley said. Its not healthy for this society, especially for young people, to think of judges as being detached, in a robe, and behind a bench. This is not good.

Just as Almanac increased understanding about the Minnesota Legislature, Hanley wants the centers to make progress in demystifying the judicial branch and the judges who serve within it. [People] need to understand that these are real human beings making real judgments and that those judgments are based on something real and not just something they are making up, he said.

Beyond the exhibits in the centers, Hanley said the centers will provide a website and host live events. Hes currently collaborating on an event focused on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women that is likely to be held in March.

Tunheim said some live center events might celebrate the opening of exhibits. Over the years, the District of Minnesota has developed exhibits that have been on display in a given courthouse. Currently, there is one in the Duluth courthouse that commemorates the lynchings that happened in Duluth in 1920. [We] made sure people knew what a horrific, racial terror event that was and that it didnt just happen in the South, it happened in Minnesota as well, Tunheim said.

The judge added that the court traditionally offers a summer program for high school students in which they study the judiciary and other branches of government. He hopes that program can be expanded in connection with the Justice & Democracy Centers.

Business, media, and democracy

Informed and engaged citizens support democratic institutions. Tunheim noted that a functioning democracy also supports a capitalist society.

Having strong democratic institutions, as our country has had throughout history, has always been an important foundation of our entire business community, Tunheim said. Businesses need a fair, independent and responsible judiciary to resolve disputes, he said, and democratic institutions also make sure that competition is fair and those with the great ideas and great initiatives can flourish.

Both the Minnesota Business Partnership and the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce have emphasized the important role that immigrants play in the states economy. In March, the Minnesota Chamber Foundation released a report that examined The Economic Contributions of Immigrants in Minnesota.

Tunheim has elevated the roles that immigrants occupy in Minnesotas workforce and communities by holding some naturalization ceremonies outside of courtrooms. He will be doing one Tuesday at Westminster Presbyterian Church before he gives his democracy speech. About 25 people will take the oath of allegiance and become new U.S. citizens.

There is such heated rhetoric about immigration in this day and age, Tunheim said. These are wonderful people who have worked very hard to become American citizens. The court administers oaths to more than 15,000 new citizens in Minnesota every year, he said.

We have people who have chosen to come to America to become an American citizen, much like our ancestors did a long time ago, Tunheim said. It is important for us to get out to the community to do these ceremonies to give it a different side of immigration, a side that celebrates the fact that we are welcoming people, that we need them, we want them, and they are good citizens.

When Tunheim was a boy growing up in the small town of Newfolden in northwestern Minnesota, many people got their news from daily newspapers and discussed government issues from a common set of facts. From grades five through nine, Tunheim delivered newspapers seven days a week on his bicycle.

Being a paperboy, I was always proud of the fact that most of the people in town took the daily Minneapolis paper, he said. And if you didnt take the Minneapolis paper, the Star or the Tribune, you took the Grand Forks Herald in the afternoon.

Bundles of Minneapolis newspapers were tossed off of the Soo Line northbound passenger train, Tunheim said, and he would retrieve them from the depot boardwalk. Virtually everybody was reading daily newspapers when I was young, and I think that contributed greatly to a sense of the importance of understanding the news, the importance of our democratic institutions and the work that they did, Tunheim said.

In 2021, many people rely on partisan broadcast media and social media for their news. That reality has fueled tribalism, Tunheim said, adding that national trends have adversely affected Minnesotas decades-long pattern of healthy civic involvement and good government.

You can see the difficulty of reaching compromises that were much easier to reach a generation ago, particularly if you look at the Legislature, Tunheim said, and if you look at the differences among our members of Congress in terms of their viewpoints on issues.

Read the rest here:
Buttressing Democracy in Minnesota - Twin Cities Business Magazine