World News & Views

Since 1963 West Papua, a land whose rich natural resources are being exploited by multi-national corporations, has been occupied by the Indonesian armed forces. The people of West Papua have been subjected to gross human rights violations including rape, torture, cultural genocide, murder and massacre.

Ms. Zeituni Onyango is a 56-year-old woman from Kenya who is seeking political asylum in the U.S. She is also the aunt of Sen. Barack Obama. "Auntie Zeituni," as Obama has referred to her in one of his books, was ordered to leave the U.S. four years ago and she is living in the U.S. illegally.

A dangerous little DVD inserted into newspapers in 70 cities last month titled "Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West" is a deliberately frightening view of "radical Islam." Imagine those who received it going to a Palin rally and hearing Barack Obama's middle name spat out. These cannot be coincidences.

"We are looking forward to a great day to celebrate," said Malik Obama, the candidate's step-brother, dismissing any suggestion that his relative might not become the first Black U.S. president. "We are not considering that possibility. I am not," he said.

Read Barack Obama's victory speech, which begins: "If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer." Watch the speech by clicking on Videos under Topics to your left.

Following "Break the Silence" Congo Week, Kambale Musavuli urges the global community, and African-Americans in particular, to revitalize international attention on the Congo as a means of shedding light on the ongoing conflict and harnessing the potential for strong advocacy relationships.

On Thursday, May 31, 2007, my first-born daughter, Jasmine, had the amazing opportunity of having lunch with Barack Obama. The next morning, it was Johnathan's turn. And this week, the door of the SUV my son Michael and his friends were chasing on their skate boards swung open, and Obama yelled, "Come on, dudes, get in!"

What makes this conflict particularly sickening is the role of U.S. and European corporations, together with Rwanda and Uganda, in the plunder of DRC's resources. This is a war about self-interest and greed.

I know no honest, informed Congo watchers who doubt that Gen. Laurent Nkunda and his ruthless militia are tools of the U.S. and its African proxy, Rwanda, in the imperial resource war now raging in Eastern Congo.

By now, I am sure that you are aware of the fallout over the Nov. 4 election results that passed Proposition 8, an amendment to the state constitution to make marriage legal only between one man and one woman. No doubt many of you reading this op-ed were a part of the 69 percent of Blacks who supported the measure.

I grew up with the picture on the left. That's the America that lynched Black soldiers in their uniforms after World War II. It's the America I was taught. It's the America unfortunately I've lived through. It's the America that killed the Dreamer. But on Nov. 4, 2008, I was most happy to actually meet the America that chose to make the picture on the right its new dawn. I don't know this America. I didn't think it was possible.

"No one cares about the children, living or dead," one furious father of children in the collapsed school outside of Port au Prince, Haiti, swore Sunday. "Government officials and people from all the NGOs, they all come, take pictures, make speeches and they leave us with nothing. We need action!"

Today I was slated to speak in Damascus, Syria, at a conference to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the 60th year that the Palestinian people have been denied their Right of Return enshrined in that declaration. But I was not allowed to exit the country.

Some of us remember the first elected prime minister of the Congo, Patrice Lumumba, as he brought to the world the vision of a prosperous Congo where this beautiful land will benefit the Congolese people and not world corporations. A modern day holocaust is occurring in this picturesque land of abundance.

The war in Congo is a U.S. proxy war; the U.S. uses Kagame, the Rwandan army and terrorist Gen. Laurent Nkunda as their African proxy force in Congo, but this is war. It has been the deadliest, though barely reported, war on the planet for years.

Protest to free Mumia and Troy Davis, two innocent men facing execution, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 4:30pm, at the Federal Courthouse, 7th & Mission, San Francisco. Mumia and Troy are challenging the “law of the land” that says, “Innocence is no defense.” Pennsylvania and Georgia seek their execution. We demand their freedom.

Grassroots activist Ronald Dauphin, a supporter of President Aristide, was arrested by armed paramilitary troops on March 1, 2004 - the day after U.S. officials forced Aristide into exile. Mr. Dauphin has spent five years in jail without having been convicted of any crime.

The case of Bowoto v. Chevron pitted Chevron and its relationship with the notoriously violent Nigerian police and military against Nigerians who peacefully protested the destruction of their environment and livelihood by Chevron's oil production activities.

While Adham and the more than 3,500 professional fishermen who scour Gaza's waters for needed sustenance and sources of income are accustomed to Israeli navy harassment, Tuesday's encounter was different, heightened.

All of us in the Free Gaza Movement, whether passengers on the boats or part of the support teams, are outraged that 1.5 million Palestinians are being collectively punished by the apartheid policies of the Israeli state.