← From Our Own Correspondent
From Our Own Correspondent
20 Oct 2011
00:28:20
Kate Adie introduces reports from around the world. Today Jonathan Head ask what keeps...
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You're listening to a download from the BBC.
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This is from our own correspondent. You can hear the version of the programme broadcast on the World Service by
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following the link to the iplayer on
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But now, with the addition Broadcast on
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Radio 4, here's Kate Ady.
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Today, what keeps the fighters in Libya going, risking their lives when perhaps they don't really have to? We hear of living as a prisoner in your own flat with young children in the middle of the Syrian revolution, the confusion of how to vote after Tunisia's Jasmine revolution, and why the Asian tsunami has been good for the orangutans of Sumatra. It's been a fortnight since the forces of the new interim government in Libya launched their final assault on the coastal town of Sirte. As the fighters went from building to building this week, trying to flush out the last remnants of the Gaddafi loyalists, their loss losses continued to rise. Jonathan Head was at the start of the battle for Sirte, watching the volunteer fighters of the Libyan revolution. Many of them had no military training, but they were willing to risk all. He reflects on what's driven them and finds echoes of similar feelings from earlier battles for the same land.
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It was the opening day of what we now understood was the final battle for Sirte. The road running south of the town was packed with tanks, trucks and fighters. The air shook with the blast of guns and mortars, but the only way to reach the town was across a stretch of dangerously exposed, rough ground. This was the job given to the brigade we got to know in the week leading up to the attack. It was one of around 70 volunteer units from Misrata established during the earlier struggle for control of that city. It was one of the better units, thanks to the charisma of its commander, Lamin. Unlike the other men, Lamin had had some military experience, although he'd spent most of his working life until the conflict broke out this year in Misrata's giant steel works. He wasn't tall and walked with a pronounced limp caused by a shrapnel injury. But with his growling voice, his thick black beard and glinting eyes, he had rare authority over his men. One barked instruction was usually enough to get them scurrying into action. He was also instantly likable, open, hospitable and fun. But confronted that morning by withering sniper fire, his men balked at making the dash in their converted gun trucks towards the first buildings Insert I was too far back to see what happened next, but they told me Lahmin decided he had to set an example by leading from the front. He was hit twice in the chest and died in the arms of his close friend Aziz. He left behind an eight month old daughter and his wife, who's pregnant with their second child. Most of the fighters I met in Sirte were excitable young men who showed little awareness of the huge risks they took with their lives. Not just in their headlong rush to battle, but also from their cavalier handling of all the weapons they'd inherited from the Gaddafi regiment. But Lahmin and Aziz weren't like that. Both of them were older men, very conscious of their family commitments and of the pain caused by lost lives. They'd endured months of savage street fighting in Misrata. They surely were entitled to say that they'd done their bit and to leave the battle for Sirte to others. I spent quite a bit of time with Aziz, who's a former sports teacher, and asked him about what drove him to keep leaving his family and head back to the front line. He's got six children. His youngest, Mohammed, is just a month old. I can't stop until this is finished, he said. I have to see it through. I owe it to all those who've died and I owe it to our new country. Many people have been surprised by the tenacity and courage shown by Libyans during their uprising. One woman explained it to me like this. In your country, it's unfashionable to be patriotic, she said, to care about things like a flag. But in Libya, you have to understand that under Gaddafi, we never had a flag or a real country. He made everything his personal project. Changing the flag, the political system, even the name of the country. We were just his props. So fighting for this flag, for our reborn nation, really means something to us. I found it easy to empathize with this view because I had been re reading the diary written by my grandfather, who was passing through the same parts of Libya 69 years earlier with the allied forces driving the German Afrika Korps westward. In fact, he spent the Christmas of 1942 not far from Sirte, which he describes then as largely destroyed by the fighting and so littered with mines and booby traps, it was difficult to explore the town. He wrote the diary for my mother, his only child born in the year war broke out, because he did not expect to survive it and wanted her to know something of himself and his thoughts about the world he lived in. He was a man of his times, a staunch believer in the British Empire and the supremacy of Western ideas. But he also comes across as compassionate, humorous and principled. And he tries to explain to my mother why he, an older man who'd had the option of serving his country in the comparative safety of Britain, chose to risk fighting overseas. I'm an able bodied man, he writes, and I love my country and I really want my part in her struggle to be as much to the limit of my capabilities as the next man's. It's difficult to say or write anything like that without appearing guilty of heroics, but that's what I feel and that's the main reason for my action, for I've no more wish to be killed than you have. My grandfather went missing, presumed killed in 1943. I don't know what memories Commander Lamin will leave for his young children, but I hope they come to know something about him and his motives for putting himself in harm's way.
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Jonathan Head and the motivation to keep fighting in Libya In Syria there isn't all out war but thousands of people have died in the last few months as demonstrations against President Assad's regime continue and the regime itself responds with bullets and tank shells. The Syrian government is blaming the unrest in the country on armed terrorist groups and says over a policemen and soldiers have been killed. The President has defied UN and European Union calls to step down and this week thousands of people turned out in support of him in a state organized demonstration in the northern city of Aleppo. Foreign journalists are not being allowed into Syria, but Sue Lloyd Roberts managed to sneak in to the city of Homs where much of the opposition is centred.
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Four year old Khaled runs to the front door, headbutts it and screams I want to go out. His mother grabs him before he can do himself an injury. His baby brother wakes up and starts crying. The sound of angry childish rage fills the small apartment. I'm sorry, says their mother, um Khaled with tears running down her face. They can't help it. I'm hiding in Homs, the so called capital of the Syrian revolution with the family of a political activist. The city has been in a state of near siege, surrounded by President Assad's army for seven months now. I'm getting a taste of what this means from a woman and a mother's point of view at least the men can do drive tanks and fire their weapons if they're on one side, prepare their anti government slogans and march in the now daily demonstrations if they're on the other hand, women and children are virtual prisoners. Since pro government thugs started kidnapping, raping and even killing women, few dare leave their homes. The sound of gunfire over the city is constant. All the shopping from the few stores which are open is done by the men. But um Khaled's husband, Mohammed, also has a revolution to organize. He's forgotten to buy the baby nappies for over a week now. His wife encourages him to hold meetings of the Revolutionary Council of Homs in their flat. That way at least she knows where he is. For her, it means non stop cooking, washing up and looking after the children. And then there's the revolutionary hours. Meetings go on until four in the morning and the revolutionaries sleep until midday on sofas and on the floor. The children have to be persuaded not to disturb them. And now she has me sleeping on the floor as well, adding to her work and anxiety. I try and lighten her burden by playing with the children and helping in the kitchen, a routine which is interrupted when I'm accompanied down the stairs from the fourth floor apartment by Mohammed to be taken by car to attend demonstrations and record interviews. I'm wearing a hijab and sunglasses, but still I arouse suspicion. You've got a foreigner staying with you, the woman on the third floor says to um Khalid accusingly after she seen me on the stairs one day. She's a cousin of my husband from Kuwait, she says in reply, hoping this will account for my foreignness. If the family were caught harbouring a foreign journalist, it would end in imprisonment and torture for Mohammed. Mohammed takes me on a tour of the city and points out the signs of months of attack by President Assad's army. Burned out bus shelters, buildings pockmarked with shell holes, piles of uncollected rubbish in the street. They punish the areas where demonstrations take place, he explains, by cutting the services. We have plenty of rats, but we can be without water, electricity and communications for days. We drive past schools which have been attacked and are closed. Some are being used as prisons for the protesters. They're covered in graffiti. One rather unnervingly says, we want free doom with a double O. I try to imagine what it must be like to be a mother of older children. And many families have eight or more. How could um Khaled persuade teenage boys to stay at home? With the schools closed and no sport or entertainment possible? The daily demonstrations and the killing are now the only show in town. As the capital of the revolution, Homs has borne the brunt of the casualties of more than 3,000 believed to have been killed over the last seven months, and many believe the figure is much higher. Over 1300 have been killed in Homs, including children. True to the Arab tradition and even in these exceptional times, Om Khaled is a generous and kind host, lending me pyjamas and a sleeping bag and everything I left behind when I was smuggled into the city. She refuses to accept gifts or payments for my stay, but I can see the relief in her eyes when I eventually leave. You must come and stay with me in London when this is all over, I say. When it's all over, she says, reaching for her son as he makes a break for the door. I pray to God it will be over before Khaled is old enough to make it out onto the street. Inshallah.
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Sue Lloyd Roberts here. A few years back, we had the case of baby P. Who suffered appalling injuries and was killed while in the care of his mother and her boyfriend. And more cases since of child abuse have made the news, especially when the children have been known to social services. Of course, no country can have a perfect child protection service. But there is rising concern in the United States about the rates of deaths of children who suffer abuse. There are Natalia Antolava has been to Texas, the state which is reported to have the highest rate of child abuse deaths in America, to try to find out what's been going wrong.
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Stacy Kunai never learned how to cry. In a calm, slightly robotic voice, she explained to me why crying was forbidden in my house. She said, you cried when you were beaten, you got hit more, you resisted when you got raped, it lasted longer. It was more violent. A childhood of abuse has put a nervous smile on Stacy's face. Clutching her hands together, she described the constant, paralyzing state of fear she lived through as a child. It's only now in her 40s that she's beginning to piece together her broken life for her brother, though it's too late. Also an abuse victim, he's in prison for life for killing their parents first their father, who was the abuser than their mother, who had failed to protect them. One study done in a New York prison shows that 66% of inmates had been abused as children. It was a friend of mine, a pediatrician in a Houston hospital, who first gave me the idea to look into the issue of child abuse in the US you can't imagine the number of children I see who've been beaten, raped, starved. Child abuse is an epidemic, she said. I found it hard to believe her, and even now, despite all the evidence gathered through months of research and dozens of interviews with doctors, educators, legislators and social service workers, I still find myself struggling to accept that this really is happening in the world's richest democracy. But call numbers from the official registry show that every five hours a child dies in the US from abuse or neglect. Experts say real numbers are much higher. Dr. Matt Cox, who runs the Abuse and Neglect clinic at Dallas Children's Hospital, told me he's still shocked by the levels of brutality that he sees every day. Imagine three siblings who had been locked up in a bathroom for nine months. They were brought here skin and bones, having been tortured and physically and sexually abused. Once or twice a week, Dr. Cox drives to a local courthouse to testify on behalf of his young patients. He's received death threats because of some of his court appearances. I went along to a hearing in a case of a six month old girl who was brought to the hospital with serious head and spinal injuries. Her mother said she had rolled out of a window while sleeping. Dr. Cox did not believe her. Diagnosing abuse, he says, can be extremely difficult. Children don't necessarily have the bruises or injuries we think of when we imagine a battered child. We need more doctors who are trained in child abuse, he said. Many educators and police officers have told me the we need to pay more attention. Identifying abuse should be part of the training. One former police officer told me. Stacey still wonders how different her life would have been if someone had spotted her troubles. But the family moved off and she never dared to call the police. And for a long time she didn't even realize that something was wrong. It was only in high school, she told me, that I found out that being raped by your father wasn't something that happened in every family. Abuse is more widespread in areas with high rates of poverty and teenage pregnancy, in places where the state offers little social safety net and children are simply allowed to fall through the cracks of the system. John Paul Scott, an investigator who works for the Child Protection Services, or cps, in Texas, explained why he thinks Texas is failing its children. He is currently investigating 35 cases. That's double the recommended caseload. John Paul wasn't authorised to speak to us, but he said he'd had enough. Investigators are getting burned out and our management doesn't listen to us. Often we say that a child has to be removed from home, but then nothing happens, he said. Up to 40% of children who die from abuse in the US have open files with Child Protection Services. Critics agree that the agency needs to be more efficient and better staffed. But many also point out that the CPS can only step in once abuse has been reported. It's all of our job to protect children. I heard over and again from people who are trying to break the cycle of violence that begins in childhood. The problem is that it's a battle they say they will lose unless the rest of America acknowledges the scale of the problem.
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Natalia Antalava it all began in Tunisia with the Jasmine revolution, and so the Arab Spring was born. Few could have imagined how far it would spread, and few can predict what the ultimate outcome will be. In Tunisia, at least, the revolution was peaceful, and so far it's remained so. This weekend they're holding elections to choose an assembly which is supposed to draw up a new constitution for the country. But how do you deal with these trappings of democracy, like campaigning and voting, when you haven't experienced them before? That's what Celeste Hicks sought to discover.
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Far from the smart cafes and bars in downtown Tunis, a family of 26 people are living under carpets and tarpaulins on a pavement next to a roaring motorway. It's now a crisp autumn day in the suburb of Siciliana, and 26 year old Nayla Herrera walks me towards her family's small fire burning on the open street. I'm not going to vote in these elections, she says tearfully, as a small child drags a huge water carrier across the street. Look at my family living on the street on the pavement. Naylor's grandmother wants to show me a wound on her leg. She had an operation to remove a growth, but the family can't afford surgery to heal the hole left behind. I have a diploma in publicity and marketing, says Naylor, clutching a certificate in Arabic. But I can't find a job. Can you imagine? I don't even have an address to give to a potential employer. Nayla had seen us journalists as we followed candidates for the Tunisia for Tomorrow party on the campaign trail, the first time she could remember any politicians coming to this neighbourhood. The story of young people like Nayla and their struggle to find work has been called the spark that set off January's Jasmine revolution. Mohamed Bouazizi, a young street vendor from the central town of Sidi Bouzid, set himself on fire last December, allegedly after repeated harassment by the Tunisian authorities. He never regained consciousness to see what followed. He died on January 4. The symbols of the revolution are everywhere on the smart boulevard Avenue Habib Bourguiba in central Tunis, where old fashioned trams rattle along the streets. In one bookshop, a red souvenir book screams degage at passers by, a French phrase which means clear off, and became a rallying cry for everyone who wanted former President Zinel Aberdeen Ben Ali to leave. Next to it, a comic strip book, and another on the bloggers who did so much to bring down the president by organizing protests using social media. But the revolution has not brought work. In fact, the Tunisian Workers Communist Party claims that unemployment has actually gone up since January. Sunday's vote for a constitutional assembly will not bring quick results. The body will have a year to write a constitution, and only then will presidential elections take place. Still, the remarkable thing is that most of the young people I've spoken to seem patient and willing to see the process through. If anything, the biggest problem is confusion about how the voting system works. It's hard for people who've no experience of democracy to follow this process, says Serene Mohammed, a bright young radio journalist. In some cases, people will go to vote and There'll be nearly 100 names on the list, she says. We're sitting in one of Tunis plushest spots, Le Golf, in the upmarket suburb of La Marsa. The restaurant looks out over the Mediterranean Sea, crashing against the shore. Heavy autumnal rain lashes down the window pane, obscuring the view of a lone fisherman on the beach. We're sipping lattes. This is a Muslim country, but wine is also on sale here. Serene does not wear a veil. This scene could be a snapshot of the big questions facing Tunisia. The moderate Islamic party in ACTA looks likely to win the biggest share of votes in the election. Serene explains to me how the party was repressed under the strictly secular regime of Ben Ali, but in fact this gave them more political experience and profile than most other parties. Tunisia still has to chart a path for its new constitution between looking out across the sea to Europe or turning towards its Arab Muslim neighbors. Demonstrations which turned violent last week after a TV station showed the film Persepolis, which depicts a young Iranian girl's struggle with her faith and identity, reflect that tension. Serene herself was recently involved in the screening of a film which pokes fun at religion, and she worries that elements in society may react. We have to challenge ourselves and debate these issues, she says. But it's clear some people don't want that. When I ask young people in the street what they think of an actor, it's either love em or hate em. The party itself has been at pains to insist it doesn't want a constitution based on Sharia law and that it will uphold women's rights. These elections are only the first step in setting up a robust new system. And if an actor does well, then that's democracy, something Tunisia is still learning how to deal with.
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Celeste Hicks in Tunisia the Asian tsunami on boxing day in 2004 killed more than 230,000 people in 14 countries. One of the areas worst affected was the region of Aceh in northern Sumatra in Indonesia. At the time, there had been an insurgency going on around Aceh. The devastation caused by the tsunami helped trigger the peace agreement, which is still holding, and Jonathan Barker recently found out there have also been some good consequences for other local inhabitants of the region. The Old Men of the Forest the
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day Kiss Kiss bit my finger I didn't think much of it, asriel told me as he held up the stump where his index finger used to be. I'd been working with him for many months, but one day in play, he just bit me too hard. It wasn't his fault. Azril Abdullah works for the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program. His job involves taking orangutans that have been kept illegally as pets and releasing them back into the forest. Next it's Kiskis turn, and Azril is going to have good reason to remember him, and not only for that lost finger. As we drove down a rutted dirt track, Azrael explained how there were now only 6,600 wild orangutans left in the forests of Sumatra. So far, the conservation program has released 129 apes, but now they were opening a new release center here in Sumatra's northern province of Aceh. In the back of our pickup, three metal boxes contained Kiskis and two other orangutans. The jeep turned a corner, revealing a few wooden cabins beside a river. This used to be the training camp for the Free Aceh Movement who fought the Indonesian government for 30 years, Azra informed me. And are those their old huts? I asked. No, no, he replied. They're cabins donated by the international relief effort after the tsunami of 2004 and then brought here from the coast were no longer needed. On 26 December 2004, Aceh was hit harder than anywhere else by the tsunami that swept across this part of Southeast Asia. Over 130,000 people died, eight times more than the recent tsunami in Japan. Azrael suffered terrible personal loss. Both his mother and mother in law died. Their bodies have never been identified, but are probably among the tens of thousands buried in mass graves. Next morning we waded across the river to the orangutans now in their release cages. Twelve months ago, Kis Kiss had been found chained by the neck in a university lecturer's back garden. Although it's been illegal to keep an orangutan as a pet, since the 1970s, 2,800 have been confiscated, but not a single person has ever been prosecuted. The majority are owned by government officials, army officers or the police. I followed Azra up the slippery riverbank to the edge of the forest and the cages. From here I could see pristine rainforests stretching to the horizon. Today, only a third of Sumatra's rainforest is still intact. Most has been cut down for logging and palm oil plantations. Aceh has the single largest forested area in Southeast Asia, in part protected by the 30 year civil war. In the weeks that followed the tsunami, both the Free Aceh movement and the Indonesian government realized the catastrophe presented a unique opportunity to make peace. Soon after, Aceh was made a semi autonomous province with control over its own forests, giving Asril and the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program the opportunity to release apes here. We walked up to Kiskis cage and Azrael handed him some fresh termites to eat. It's important he gets used to forest food, Azra explained. When he was a pet, he was probably fed scraps of human food and sugary drinks. A few days after Kiss Kiss had settled in, we returned to release him into the forest for the first time. This was an anxious moment for Azriel. No one knows Kiskis life story. He may never have been in a forest or climbed a tree before. As the cage door opened, he darted out and climbed onto the roof, but then stopped as if he didn't know what to do next. Having spent most of his life in captivity, it could be a couple of years before Kiskis is self reliant, Azriel told me. I learnt a long time ago you have to be patient. At the end of the day he was returned to the security of his cage and we waded back across the river. That night I asked Asdrael how he felt about releasing orangutans here for the first time. If this tsunami had never happened, the war might still be going on and we wouldn't be releasing orangutans here in Acehope, he said. But neither would my mother and mother in law be dead. He paused for a moment and then looked down at his missing finger. I should have gone to the doctor earlier, he said, smiling wryly. Then it might have healed. But losing my finger is a small price to pay. If Kiskis and hundreds of other orangutans can be saved from extinction.
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Jonathan Barker. And with his fingers still intact. We've reached the end of this edition. I'll be here again on Saturday with more from our correspondence. Join us. Goodbye.