"The first victory we can claim is that our hearts are free of hatred. Hence we say to those who persecute us and who try to dominate us: ‘You are my brother. I do not hate you, but you are not going to dominate me by fear. I do not wish to impose my truth, nor do I wish you to impose yours on me. We are going to seek the truth together’. THIS IS THE LIBERATION WHICH WE ARE PROCLAIMING."
Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas (2002)
"I usually describe the struggle between power of the gun and power of
the truth. Short term power of gun is more decisive and powerful. In the
long run power of truth much, much stronger." - His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Prague Czech Republic, September14, 2013
Cuesta Morua addressing the Dalai Lama with Yris Perez Aguilera at his side
In Prague on Saturday, September 15, 2013 Cuban dissident Cuesta Morua asked His Holiness the Dalai Lama to speak up on Cuba. Standing next to him was Cuban opposition activist Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera. In the video below beginning at 2 hours and 3 minutes and 44 seconds is the full exchange:
Below is an excerpt of the exchange:
Cuesta Morua: "Holiness, for me its an honor to be here. I'm part of a team of five people coming from Cuba. For first time we are invited here by Forum 2000. ... We come from a nation fighting for freedom like yours. My question is what is your spiritual message for a people who have been fighting for freedom for many years, 45 years, speaking broadly. ... We think your message would be very important for a nation who don't know who you are and we would like back to Cuba to tell our people that the Dalai Lama have a good message for them."
Dalai Lama: ..."Change not by force but by common sense I think. Now Cuba changing, I see comparatively. This things I usually describe as the struggle between power of gun and power of truth. Short term power of gun is much more decisive and powerful. Long run power of truth much, much stronger. Some people who under difficult circumstances must keep your spirit, your hope, your determination and in some cases maybe little more patience. You should not let cause of under emotions - that you should not do as I mentioned earlier. Analyze the situation then how much you can move. Sometimes , difficult to move but with firm belief the power of truth in the long run will win and keep your will power with some patience. Okay. Thats my view. Of course ultimately you have to take the decision. I just shared my view."
The Power of the Powerless and the Farcical Elections in Cuba
"Even a purely moral act that
has no hope of any immediate and visible political effect can gradually
and indirectly, over time, gain in political significance." - Vaclav Havel, Letter to Alexander Dubček (August 1969)
Blogger Yoani Sanchez's voided ballot
In a totalitarian state, such as Cuba, where only the communist party is "legal" and dissent is outlawed even a purely symbolic act like annulling a ballot with the word democracy requires courage. Why does it take courage? Because in Cuba demonstrating dissent with the governing regime can mean that the dissenter and other adult relatives can lose their jobs, their children can be blacklisted from pursuing higher education and can also be targeted by government organized mobs at school. Their is also an undercurrent of terror that far worse things can happen to you and your loved ones. Finally, whats the point if you annul a ballot it is the dictatorship that counts the ballots in the end giving whatever result they deem suitable.
Czech dissident Vaclav Havel understood the great importance of such purely moral acts and the power of the powerless who rejected the lies propagated by the regime in power in order to live in truth. Vaclav Havel in his 1978 essay The Power of the Powerless offered the following observation that is relevant to Cuba today:
"When I speak of living within the truth, I naturally do not have in
mind only products of conceptual thought, such as a protest or a letter
written by a group of intellectuals. It can be any means by which a
person or a group revolts against manipulation: anything from a letter
by intellectuals to a workers' strike, from a rock concert to a student
demonstration, from refusing to vote in the farcical elections to making
an open speech at some official congress, or even a hunger strike, for
instance."
Mohandas Gandhi on September 11, 1906 in South Africa took part in the creation of "Satyagraha" the word that would describe their nonviolent resistance:
'Satyagraha.' Truth (Satya) implies
love, and firmness (agraha) engenders and therefore serves as a
synonym for force. I thus began to call the Indian movement
'Satyagraha,' that is to say, the Force which is born of Truth and
Love or non-violence, and gave up the use of the phrase 'passive
resistance,' in connection with it, so much so that even in English
writing we often avoided it and used instead the word 'Satyagraha'
itself or some other equivalent English phrase.
The choice that each and every human being faces today is the choice of living an integrated life within the truth backing it up with action or passively accepting the lie propagated by those in power. Cuba in 2012 is a cautionary example of what happens to a country and a people who have accepted the latter of the two options for half a century. It destroys not only the physical infrastructure of a country but the soul of its people. Over the past few months following the death of Oswaldo Paya the world has seen how even a Spanish political leader can fail to live in truth and go along with the lie only to be sentenced to four years in prison in a Stalinist show trial. The West is not immune to the tentacles of totalitarianism. Militarism, the spread of surveillance technology, and the consolidation of media along with the decline of "objective" and investigative news reporting are troubling trends that threaten democracy. The complacency towards existing totalitarian regimes is another troubling sign.
The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was not inevitable but the result of a number of factors not least of which was the decision of millions of Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Germans, Lithuanians, and Estonians to no longer live within the lies of the totalitarian regimes under which they had suffered for decades and the courage to back it up with concrete nonviolent action.
Over 40 years after the letter to Dubcek, when President Barack Obama backed out of meeting
with the Dalai Lama due to an upcoming trip to China, Vaclav Havel offered the
corollary to the theorem expounded in the quote at the top of this essay in 1968 at the October 12, 2009 of the Forum 2000 conference he had organized:
I
believe that when the new Laureate of the Nobel Peace Prize postpones
receiving the Dalai Lama until after he has accomplished his visit to
China, he makes a small compromise, a compromise which actually has
some logic to it. However, there arises a question as to whether those
large, serious compromises do not have their origin and roots in
precisely these tiny and very often more or less logical compromises.
Ending or initiating decades of tyranny is up to each and everyone of us and the choices we make for good or ill. The consequences of which future generations will have to live with and make their own choices to engage in moral acts or compromise their principles. Vaclav Havel passed away on December 18, 2011 but his contributions and good works live on. Today in the Czech Republic activists, intellectuals and politicians gather to reflect on and discuss challenges facing humanity today seeking solutions at the Forum 2000. Meanwhile in Castroite Cuba farcical elections are underway in which only one party is running and the only choice Cubans have is either to go along with the fraudulent exercise or void their ballot as the country continues its half century descent into ruin.
Agents of the People's Republic of China kidnapped a small child named Gedhun Choekyi Nyima.He was 6 years old in 1995 when he was recognized by His Holiness the Dalai Lama as the 11th reincarnation of the Panchen Lama, one of Tibet's most important religious leaders. Gedhun Choekyi Nyima was born on April 25, 1989 in central Tibet. As soon as he was
recognized as the 11th Panchen Lama, Chinese authorities took him and
his family into custody. A few other people, among them Chartral
Rinpoche, the head of the search party were arrested and sentenced for
leaking this information to the Dalai Lama.
For the past seventeen years, concerned people and human rights entities
the world over have urged the government of the Peoples Republic of China to release the
Panchen Lama to no avail. The whereabouts and well being of the Panchen
Lama, Gedhun Choekyi Nyima is a serious concern and the regime in China should release him immediately.
Today is his 23rd birthday. His 17th birthday under detention with his whereabouts unknown.
The current situation prevailing at Kirti Monastery in Ngaba in northeastern Tibet is extremely grim because of the stand-off between the Chinese military forces and the local Tibetans. The monastery, housing approximately 2,500 monks, is completely surrounded by Chinese armed forces, who at one point prevented vital food and other supplies from entering the monastic compound.
The local Tibetans fearing that this siege on Kirti Monastery is a prelude to large scale detention of the monks have surrounded the soldiers blockading the monastery and have filled the roads so as to prevent Chinese trucks and vehicles from either entering or leaving Kirti.
The local Chinese blockade of Kirti Monastery began on 16 March 2011, when a young Tibetan monk at the monastery tragically set himself on fire as a way of observing the third anniversary of the widespread peaceful protests that shook Tibet in 2008. Instead of putting out the flames, the police beat the young monk which was one of the causes of his tragic death. This act created huge resentment among the monks, which resulted in this massive blockade of Kirti Monastery.
I am very concerned that this situation if allowed to go on may become explosive with catastrophic consequences for the Tibetans in Ngaba.
In view of this I urge both the monks and the lay Tibetans of the area not to do anything that might be used as a pretext by the local authorities to massively crackdown on them.
I also strongly urge the international community, the governments around the world, and the international non-governmental organizations, to persuade the Chinese leadership to exercise restraint in handling this situation.
For the past six decades, using force as the principle means in dealing with the problems in Tibet has only deepened the grievances and resentment of the Tibetan people. I, therefore, appeal to the Chinese leadership to adopt a realistic approach and to address the genuine grievances of the Tibetans with courage and wisdom and to restrain from using force in handling this situation.
I greet you respectfully with profound admiration, unable to conceive the ideal words that could express all the love and devotion I profess towards you and your people.
Your visit to Miami vivifies the desire for freedom of a people forced into exile during the last decades. Your story and that of your people are one and the same with outs. Tibetans and Cubans, geographically distant, yet, close as they bear a suffering imposed by a common adversary: communism, usurper of our homelands.
A large number of Cubans support the independence and freedom of Tibet. In your struggle, you may count on the support of the members of The Lawton Foundation who recognize your authority as Tibet's head of State. We call on the nations of the world to officially recognize this exemplar for the good of humanity in its struggle to obtain universal respect for the inalienable rights of man.
The great work of the prince Gautama Buddha is today a reality. His heart reflects the true light that leads to the path of uprightness and a life full of God, as he leads his people to a level of superior peace through the use of nonviolent means of resistance.
Contemporary of Siddhartha, the “Illuminated", was the prophet Isaiah who, in his book of divine wisdom, stated: " Pay attention to Me, O My people, And give ear to Me, O My nation; For a law will go forth from Me, And I will set My justice for a light of the peoples." (Isaiah 51:4)
The acceptance of these words by Buddha, would complement our existence: "A heart, already free, has eliminated all desire."
I remain, sincerely yours,
Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet Lawton Foundation for Human Rights Havana, Cuba
Yet the principles of nonviolent resistance to evil espoused by Mohandas Gandhi over a century ago are today taught by moral exemplars such as His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama who on twitterobserves that"Living a truly ethical life, putting the needs of others first and providing for their happiness, has tremendous implications for society," and that "Compassion and love constitute non-violence in action."
PRAGUE – On November 7, when Burma’s first general election for almost two decades is to be held, a well-rehearsed script will play out. The country’s ruling generals will twist what is meant to be a democratic process, whereby the people get to express their will, into a mockery of free expression in which people vote in fear and without hope.
The international community must judge Burma’s generals by their actions, not their words and promises. The facts on the ground in Burma speak the truth more loudly than all the proclamations from the generals about a free ballot and a democratic transition.
More than 2,100 political prisoners remain in jail in Burma. Many have been tortured, kept in horrific conditions, and denied medical care. Attacks against the country’s ethnic minorities continue, with the deliberate targeting of civilians, including children, by the Burmese military and police. The country’s media remains censored, freedom of expression denied, and the most popular political party in the country, the National League for Democracy, which won elections in 1990, has been forced to disband because it decided not to register for the November elections.
In such conditions, free and fair elections will be impossible. This so-called democratic transition, a process designed solely by dictators and with input only from the regime’s loyalists, will result in continued dictatorship.
Before Burma’s fate is sealed in a new-model dictatorship, the United Nations must immediately and vigorously embark on a fresh process designed to deliver national reconciliation and democracy to that troubled country. The international community, East and West, must unite behind a UN-led initiative to start genuine dialogue.
But, for this dialogue to have any real legitimacy, it must include the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who has endured decades of house arrest, and her party, the NLD. Other democratic opposition groups, and genuine ethnic-minority representatives, also need to be given a voice in the process.
Pressure must be brought to bear to bring Burma’s generals to a negotiating table where real negotiations take place. All the tools at the disposal of the international community should be used to bring this about.
But responsibility for assisting Burma does not lie solely at the door of the UN. The pressure on Burma’s generals must also be bilateral and multilateral – and should be reinforced by carefully calibrated economic measures, including targeted financial and banking sanctions.
Action must also be taken to end the impunity with which the Burmese generals have ruled. The dictatorship stands accused of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, mostly against the country’s minorities, who chafe at decades of oppression, ostracism, and military misrule. The UN General Assembly should follow the UN Special Rapporteur‘s recommendation to establish a Commission of Inquiry into war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma.
Moreover, the UN Security Council should impose an arms embargo against Burma, as it has in other countries similarly afflicted by conflict and serious human rights abuses. Those countries supplying arms to Burma expose themselves to charges of complicity in the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the dictatorship.
Dictatorship and human rights abuses will continue in Burma after November 7. We do not need to wait until after the election to know this. So there is no excuse for continued inaction. Now is the time for the world to unite behind the people of Burma, and to help bring them peace and dignity at last.
Václav Havel is a former President of the Czech Republic,
His Holiness the Dalai Lama is the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism,
Time Magazine back in 1999 published The Children of Gandhi some of the names featured in the article appear below but there are others who have followed Mohandas Gandhi's path and on the 140th anniversary of his birth it seems appropriate to highlight "Gandhi's children."
They span different continents and decades confronting injustice wherever it appears and are arranged below in no particular order and is incomplete:
Aung San Suu Kyi: Military Junta in Burma
"What is there to be discouraged about? Gandhi said the victory is in the struggle itself. The struggle itself is the most important thing. I tell our followers that when we achieve democracy, we will look back with nostalgia on the struggle and how pure we were." -Aung San Suu Kyi
"I think this is the case in the great majority of authoritarian states: on the surface, because of repression, everything seems frozen, but when the sun comes out and the ice melts, you find that there was a lot of life underneath all along." -Aung San Suu Kyi
"The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed."
*From White Racism and Black Consciousness
"The system concedes nothing without demand, for it formulates its very method of operation on the basis that the ignorant will learn to know, the child will grow into an adult and therefore demands will begin to be made. It gears itself to resist demands in whatever way it sees fit."
* The Quest for a True Humanity
Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet: Castroite Cuba
"To love one's neighbor is also to love one's enemy. Although in reality that qualifier-"enemy" does not exist in my vocabulary. I recognize that I only have adversaries and I have acquired the capacity to love them because in this way we do away with violence, wrath, vengeance, hatred and substitute them with justice and forgiveness."
- Dr. Oscar Elias Biscet Gonzalez,
upon completing 40 day fast in 1999 to protest 40 years of dictatorship
His Holiness The Dalai Lama: Chinese Occupation of Tibet
"Many ancient Indian masters have preached nonviolence as a philosophy. That was a more spiritual understanding of it. Mahatma Gandhi, in this twentieth century, produced a very sophisticated approach because he implemented that very noble philosophy of nonviolence in modern politics, and he succeeded. That is a very great thing. It has represented an evolutionary leap in political consciousness, his experimentation with truth."
-- His Holiness the Dalai Lama, in an interview with Catherine Ingram, from "The Dalai Lama, A Policy of Kindness", published by Snow Lion Publications. http://www.bamboointhewind.org/teaching_dalaiquotes.html
Jorge Valls: Castroite and Batista Cuba
"Without civil rights, the best intentions turn into a trap, and societies become prisons and asylums. There is a danger that we become as alienated and as fierce as the evil we think we are fighting.That is what happened in Cuba under the Castro regime. In 1964, I was convicted of 'conspiracy against the state,' because I testified against the Castro government in a political trial, and I spent 20 years and 40 days in jail. I don't regret my time there, because I was defending this essential respectability of the human person."
-Jorge Valls
Source:http://www.cubanet.org/CNews/y00/apr00/07e13.htm
Abdul Ghaffar Khan: British India & Pakistan
He was a Pashtun political and spiritual leader known for his non-violent opposition to British Rule in India. A lifelong pacifist, a devout Muslim, and a follower of Mahatma Gandhi, he was also known as Badshah Khan (also Bacha Khan, Urdu, Pashto: lit., "King Khan"), and Sarhaddi Gandhi (Urdu, Hindi lit., "Frontier Gandhi").
"I am going to give you such a weapon that the police and the army will not be able to stand against it. It is the weapon of the Prophet, but you are not aware of it. That weapon is patience and righteousness. No power on earth can stand against it."
-Abdul Ghaffar Khan
"I had to go to prison many a time in the days of the Britishers. Although we were at loggerheads with them, yet their treatment was to some extent tolerant and polite. But the treatment which was meted out to me in this Islamic state of ours was such that I would not even like to mention it to you."
-Abdul Ghaffar Khan
Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.: Racist & Segregationist United States of America
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. ... Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that."
- Martin Luther King Jr. Where Do We Go from Here : Chaos or Community? (1967), p. 62
Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas: Castroite Cuba
"There are still those who perpetuate the myth that the exercising of political and civil rights is an alternative to a society’s ability to achieve social justice and development. They are not mutually exclusive. The absence of any civil and political rights in Cuba has had serious consequences such as inequality, the poverty of the majority and privileges of a minority and the deterioration of certain services, even though these were conceived as a positive system to benefit to the people."
"The first victory we can claim is that our hearts are free of hatred. Hence we say to those who persecute us and who try to dominate us: ‘You are my brother. I do not hate you, but you are not going to dominate me by fear. I do not wish to impose my truth, nor do I wish you to impose yours on me. We are going to seek the truth together’."
“The spiritual ethos that came to fruition in the work of Gandhi was a thousand years in the making on the great Indian subcontinent. This work is one of the major contributions of your country to modern history. It is an inspiring contribution, the impact of which can be observed again and again in all corners of the globe.”
-Vaclav Havel
“I am one of Mahatma Gandhi's admirers, and, if I may be so bold, I believe that a reflection of his life's work might even be seen in the attempt my friends and I made, in Charter 77, to create a nonviolent opposition to the totalitarian regime in our country. This aspect of our activity later had a positive influence on the course of our anti-totalitarian revolution in 1989.”
-Vaclav Havel
“If I were to say what fascinated me most about Gandhi's life, I would have to mention his stance immediately after your country gained independence, when, entirely alone, he placed himself in the path of the bloody battles between the Hindus and the Moslems and was able in Calcutta, for example, but later here in Delhi as well to stop those merciless conflicts and compel the warring factions to shake hands.” […]Gandhi's act was a triumph of human charisma over mob passions. It was a great victory for the ideas of nonviolence, tolerance, coexistence, and understanding. It was a great victory for what I would call the moral minimum, which links people of all cultures, over mutual antipathy springing from differences of faith and cultural traditions.
-Vaclav Havel
"When I recall my own path of life I cannot but speak of the violence, hatred and lies. A lesson drawn from such experiences, however, was that we can effectively oppose violence only if we ourselves do not resort to it."
Lech Walesa, Nobel Peace Prize Lecture 1983
"The defense of our rights and our dignity, as well as efforts never to let ourselves to be overcome by the feeling of hatred - this is the road we have chosen."
Benigno and Cory Aquino: Marcos Dictatorship in Philippines
"In a revolution there can really be no victors, only victims. We do not have to destroy in order to build." -Benigno Servillano Aquino
“Reconciliation should be accompanied by justice, otherwise it will not last. While we all hope for peace it shouldn't be peace at any cost but peace based on principle, on justice.”
- Corazon Aquino
“It is true you cannot eat freedom and you cannot power machinery with democracy. But then neither can political prisoners turn on the light in the cells of a dictatorship.”
- Corazon Aquino
"I have returned to join the ranks of those struggling to restore our rights and freedom through nonviolence. I seek no confrontation." - Benigno Servillano Aquino
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