Non-Governmental Congress on the Ovaherero and Nama Genocides 1904-08
October 14-16, 2016, Centre Francais de Berlin, Müllerstraße 74, 13349 Berlin, Germany
ABOUT
The congress will bring together, in solidarity and common purpose, Black, white and African people in Germany with descendants of the victims of the Ovaherero and Nama genocides 1904-1908 from all over the world
Alliance “Genocide does not have a statute of limitations!”
Press Release
07.09.2016
Government Negotiations on the Genocide of the Herero and Nama in Germany: Civil Society Shows Solidarity with Excluded Victims’ Representations and Plans Joint Genocide Congress in Berlin
Against the backdrop of the official negotiations currently underway in Berlin between a high-ranking government delegation from Namibia and the German government on Germany’s genocides against the Herero and Nama 1904-08, the nationwide NGO alliance “Völkermord verjährt nicht!” (The statute of limitations for genocide does not expire!) is urging the governments of both countries to finally recognize the Herero and Nama associations as representatives of those affected and to invite them to the negotiating table.
Open letter of the alliance Decolonize Berlin! to the editorial office of the Berliner Zeitung
Dear Sir or Madam,
on 8/26/16 your newspaper published the article “Renaming Mohrenstraße: No Respect for Berlin’s History” by Maritta Takle, Department Head for Politics and Local History. In this text, the more than 200 predominantly black and African participants of the 3rd renaming festival for Berlin’s “Mohrenstraße” on the International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition (Aug. 23) are dubbed as undemocratic “iconoclasts of modern times.” The author claims that their request to change the street name with the discriminatory foreign designation for Black and African people is one of the “requests often taken to the abstruse” by “tiny minorities.”
After the last sky is the first interdisciplinary and international festival in Germany that makes it possible to experience the multifaceted practice of contemporary Palestinian artists. With theater, film, performance, literature, spoken word, staged readings, music and dance, the festival from September 9 to October 9, 2016 is dedicated to the artistic diversity of Palestinian narratives and visions while building bridges to global contexts of colonization, flight, resistance and empowerment.
At the end of this week, the Climate Camp and the Degrowth Summer School will begin in the Rhineland. The overall theme this year is “Skills for System Change.” One day is dedicated to the challenge of “breaking hegemony – confronting racism and neoliberalism”.
Dogan Akhanli about Turkey
In 1980, the writer Dogan Akhanli witnessed a military coup in Turkey. Just like today, intellectuals and human rights activists were forced underground and into exile. Britta Bürger spoke with Dogan Akhanli in“Fazit“.
A commentary by Uri Degania:
“I never gave up my hope!”
“Erdogan acts like a dictator”.
It’s a putsch within a putsch |
Kölner Stadt Anzeiger: Interview with Dogan Akhanli | Interview conducted by Uli Kreikebaum | 20.07.2016
here
“You don’t shoot at pigeons ” – a conversation with the writer Dogan Akhanlı about coming to terms with the Armenian genocide. | Interview: Ceren Türkmen
here
“I have learned to live well with my traumas”.
The German-Turkish writer Dogan Akhanli on the current political situation in Turkey
By Roland Kaufhold | Neues deutschland | 11.8.2016
here
Justice in Turkey Guilty without Reason | FAZ- 26.08.2016, by Dogan Akhanli
Anyone can fall victim to the Turkish justice system: The fact that a public prosecutor charges a journalist does not protect him from having to flee from the arbitrariness of justice himself. A didactic play about the violent apparatus of an arrogant state.
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What can a world beyond growth, competition and profit look like? The multimedia project Degrowth in Bewegung(en) shows which initiatives and movements (including glokal e.V.) develop and live social, ecological and democratic alternatives. Continue reading
Press release of the alliance “Völkermord verjährt nicht!” from 13.06.2016:
The alliance “Völkermord verjährt nicht!” welcomes the criticism of the President of the German Bundestag Prof. Norbert Lammert on the lack of an official recognition of the German genocide against the Ovaherero and Nama 1904-08 by the German Bundestag expressed on 12.6.2016 in the ZDF program “Berlin direkt”.
With his reference to regret and embarrassment, the Bundestag president addresses, albeit in highly restrained language, serious failures of official German policy. The longstanding refusal of successive federal governments to recognize the genocide in Namibia remains an indictment of the Federal Republic of Germany and in no way fits its self-image as the “world champion of remembrance” and the associated exemplary critical approach to its own history. It is shameful that German politicians have to accept this omission from Turkish President Erdoğan in the same breath as his racist and abusive insults of members of the Bundestag. Here, the German government, as well as successive majorities in the Bundestag, have been shockingly caught flat-footed by decades of refusal to deal honestly with Germany’s colonial past.
Recently, the book “Prejudice Conscious Change with Anti-Bias” was published. In cooperation with Aspe / RomAS, the authors invite you to the book launch on 16.03.2016 in Berlin. A first review has already been published.
With the slogan “Brave types – extremely help” the Hamburg campaign Viva con Aqua writes out at present a journey to Uganda as price for a profit play. The tender text states:
“You will fly from Germany to Uganda accompanied by a Viva-con-Agua staff member on 18.03.2016. […] In Kampala you will meet Nobert Latim and Papa Shabani, co-founders of the crew Viva con Agua Kampala. You will accompany them in their everyday life and get to know other friends, artists and supporters of Viva con Agua in Uganda. Together you are preparing for the upcoming World Water Day on 22/03/2016: Some music and art activities and WASH workshops are planned in the Moroto project area. On 23.03.2016 you will travel back to Kampala with the Viva con Agua activists. On the two following days, workshops, music and art events, incl. Song and video shoot planned. All this will then culminate in the WELOVEYOUGANDA Music- & Artfestival #2 on Saturday, 26.03.2016. On 27.03. you will take the return flight from Kampala (Entebbe), so that you will be back in Germany on 28.03.2016.”
Actions like these are to be questioned not only under racism-critical points of view, but even development-politically very much. You could dismiss it as a barely noteworthy Twitter ad and pay no further attention to the action. However, we observe, Continue reading