Explains DW-World :

In an interview with “Inrockuptibles” magazine last summer, N'Diaye said she had decided to leave France and move to Berlin in 2007 “in great part because of Sarkozy.”

The controversy began after Eric Raoult, a lawmaker and member of Sarkozy's ruling UMP party, wrote to the culture minister last week recommending that NDiaye be reminded of the “duty of restraint” that comes with the Goncourt.

In response, France's cultural establishment has thrown accusations of censorship into the debate. Bernard Pivot, a Goncourt jury member, accused Raoult of knowing nothing about the literary scene.

N'Diaye, born in 1967 to a French mother and a Senegalese father, won the Goncourt prize for her novel, “Trois femmes puissantes” (”Three Powerful Women”), a story about three women caught between France and Senegal and the hellish ordeal of illegal migration from Africa.

“The story of these migrants has been told many times before, but if this can help people understand their fate a bit better, I will be happy,” said NDiaye.

What was it that stirred Eric Raoult's ire? No less than an interview of the woman novelist, when she answered magazine Les Inrocks's question : “Do you feel well in Sarkozy's France?” saying [fr]:

« Je trouve cette France-là monstrueuse. Le fait que nous (avec son compagnon l’écrivain Jean-Yves Cendrey, et leurs trois enfants – ndlr) ayons choisi de vivre à Berlin n’est pas étranger à ça. (…) Je trouve détestable cette atmosphère de flicage, de vulgarité… »

Renowned law blogger Maître Eolas demolishes Mr. Raoult's claim in an ironically well-argued post [Fr], finally awarding him the “Prix Busiris” (”buse” may be translated by “dolt”).

First, he rectifies a grammatical mistake :

Tout d’abord, et le ministre de la culture et de la communication aura rectifié de lui-même, le devoir de réserve ne peut en tout état de cause être dû aux lauréats mais dû par les lauréats : cette erreur de préposition fait du lauréat le créancier alors que dans l’esprit la tête du député, il en serait évidemment le débiteur.

And legally ? Among the texts, the blogger quotes of course the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen along with the European Convention on Human Rights. And the “duty of restraint”, traditionally asked from civil servants ?

Le devoir de réserve est souvent invoqué à tort et à travers par des gens qui n’y ont rien compris comme interdisant à un fonctionnaire de s’exprimer, y compris parfois sur des affaires purement privées.

The lawyer concludes on the M.P.'s dishonesty, before dealing the finishing blow :

Ajoutons à cela qu’en 2005, en tant que maire du Raincy, lors des émeutes de l’automne, il fut le premier à proclamer l’état d’urgence dans sa commune pourtant épargnée par les actes de violence afin de griller la politesse au premier ministre, ce qui montre une certaine tendance à la gesticulation inutile pour attirer l’attention sur lui.

Ce qui établit en même temps le mobile d’opportunité politique, et emporte la décision.

Other bloggers also had scathing words.

On Art contemporain, la peau de l'ours, Philippe Rillon writes [fr]:

Nous comprenons fort bien que le devoir de réserve s’impose à tout serviteur de l’Etat; mais depuis quand la littérature et les auteurs sont ils assimilés aux fonctionnaires avec leurs droits et devoirs?

Nous avions déjà une “Culture administrée”, nous voici maintenant “artistes fonctionnaires” comme si Paris était Berlin-est d’avant la chute du mur…
(…)
Il serait quand même étonnant qu’au lendemain d’une hyper-médiatique commémoration de la chute du mur, ce godillot vienne gâcher le spectacle idylique des dominos qui tombent.

Meanwhile, Marie Ndiaye, after an attempt at toning down her words in an interview with radio station Europe 1, which in the midst of the turmoil went unnoticed, appealed to French Minister of Culture Frédéric Mitterrand. The latter deems the controversy “trivial” and “ridiculous” [fr], and the main players stick to their guns [fr].

Sticking to the U.S. and French blogospheres, is it possible to somehow bridge the gap of comprehension laïcité has generated between both sides of the Atlantic Ocean?

Arthur Goldhammer, drawing a parallel between the burqa and the catholic nuns' cloth, warns against being a “zealot of laïcité” :

(…) Not everyone in the ambient society accepts these tenets of faith, but the symbol embodying them is nevertheless not banned from the streets. It is banned from the schools. Traditionally, laïcité meant exactly this kind of drawing of boundaries.

Some French bloggers, concerned by the attacks, not only religious but also political, that they feel are threatening laïcité in France, endeavored to explain the notion, and to make clear that it is a requirement for democracy and human rights.

In a may, 2009 post hosted by lemonde.fr website, Bartolomeo of librepropos [Fr] had this definition :

laïcité: La Laïcité combat tous les cléricalismes c’est à dire toute intrusion du fait religieux, de la croyance dans les institutions publiques de la République.

The historical background

The concept of laïcité first appeared with the French Revolution, and was institutionalized with the “1905 law” [of Separation of the Church and the State]. The clash with the Catholic Church finally died down, each side finding at long last its interest in the new relationship.

Dans ce concept de laïcité ouverte des années 1990, ce droit à la différence se transforma petit à petit en “une différence de droits” . L’islam absent de ce débat apparaît alors à travers l’affaire du foulard de Creil en 1989. […]

A foundation of the Republic

[La laïcité est inscrite à l'article 1 de la Constitution] “La France est une République indivisible, laïque, démocratique et sociale. Elle assure l’égalité devant la loi de tous les citoyens sans distinction d’origine, de race ou de religion. Elle respecte toutes les croyances. […]”

But it originates with the Enlightenment and the Aug. 26, 1789 Declaration of the Right of Man and of the Citizen.

Content of laïcité, in 4 points

Vivre ensemble: […] A chacun de vivre librement ses options spirituelles ou convictions philosophiques. - A tous de disposer d’un espace commun, public, assurant liberté et égalité. - mais aussi créer un monde commun aux hommes, tout en leur permettant de garder librement leurs différences.

selon 3 principes: Liberté de Conscience - Égalité des Options Spirituelles Universalité de la Loi Commune.

[par le moyen juridique de] la séparation des Églises et de l’État par la loi de 1905 [en distinguant] une Sphère Privée et une Sphère Publique

L'Ecole Laïque [en est l'outil basique pédagogique].

Franco-Ivorian Delugio, on his blog “Une vingtaine”! et quelques, explains the difference between American secularity and French laïcité :

Dans sa structure moderne, la racine immédiate de la démocratie peut se trouver dans le protestantisme américain, s’organisant pour un « vivre ensemble » au-delà de la pluralité des Églises — pour une gestion partagée de la cité commune.
Cela ne se fera pas sans heurts : ça commencera par la guerre d’indépendance pour aboutir au XXe siècle — mais dès le départ, pour les indépendantistes, la dimension de la séparation des Églises et de l’État est un acquis non négociable.
Lorsque la France révolutionnaire reprendra ce modèle américain, elle se heurtera à une Église, l’Église catholique, prétendant, contrairement aux Églises protestantes américaines, à l’unicité.
C’est ce choc qui caractérise la « laïcité à la française » : laïcité de type américain dans un contexte de combat contre une Église revendiquant le pouvoir d’une façon ou d’une autre.

He then assesses the chances and obstacles, for Islam, on this same road to laïcité, which he views as desirable and historically necessary, and he thinks that France has a specific part to play in the process :

La France est en position, de par son histoire, de mener ce combat qu’elle a déjà mené en métropole face au catholicisme.

Mais le combat sera rendu plus difficile encore par ce que dans son empire colonial, la France a fait exactement l’inverse de ce qu’elle a proclamé et de ce qu’elle a fait en métropole : elle a, à l'instar des autres puissances coloniales, consacré dans l’empire colonial des lois particulières, y compris la charia, comme vis-à-vis de la République.

And what if, beyond all these big principles the French love to ride as their hobby-horse, they drew inspiration, as suggested by MRT, from their Belgian neighbors' pragmatism, addressing the burqa issue with a mere law on security :

En Belgique et au Luxembourg, c’est tout simple : pas de ségrégation religieuse, mais une simple loi sur la sécurité afin que les personnes mal intentionnées ne déjouent pas les caméras de surveillance.
Voici le texte de loi voté en 2005:
“Sans autorisation de l’autorité compétente, il est interdit sur le domaine public de se dissimuler le visage par des grimages, le port d’un masque ou tout autre moyen, à l’exception du “temps du carnaval”.

A few weeks after stating, in the middle of his solemn address to the French Congress of MPs and Senators, that «the burqa is not welcome on the territory of the French Republic», an «information panel» was formed by a group of majority and opposition MPs, to draw up an inventory of the situation, with six months' time to give their report. Meanwhile, police intelligence counted 367 women wearing burqas in France, the accuracy of which has left some skeptical and others snickering.

Feelings appear ready to heat up as they did with the ban on the headscarf from schools in 2004. French media and the blogosphere are abuzz again, all the more so as some draw a parallel between France's apparent intention of banning the burqa, and the flogging and pending trial of several Sudanese women, among them a journalist and UN employee, for wearing trousers under their islamic veil.

Indian blogger savadati explains what is at stake for Muslim women, in her post “We love Islam so we wear burqas” :

The burqa (and the hijab, the niqab, the chador) is possibly the most controversial garment in this century. It has been used on the one hand by fundamentalist power-seeking groups like the Taliban to attain their own end, through the suppression of women. Women have been handed grisly punishments – physical and even sexual – for refusing to wear it. It was turned, in Afghanistan, into a weapon of suppression. Being forced to wear a tent-like garment at all times, for fear of being labelled a “seductress” and subjected to indignity and punishment, is a blatant breach of human rights, and feminist and other activists all over the world have opposed this. In France, the group Ni Putes, Ni Soumises (Neither Whores nor Submissive) is strong in its condemnation of the burqa. They call it a “prison under open skies” for those who wear it, and deem it an instrument to force women into submission.

On the other hand, however, a lot of women in Europe, India and West Asia have found their cultural identity in the folds of this robe-like garment. They choose to wear it because it gives them a sense of comfort and religious belonging. They are not forced and simply choose to dress this way.
(…)

She concludes :

Women who choose to wear the burqa are choosing to belong – not to feel alienated. However, if the stigma and the stereotype are allowed to blindly thrive too long, they may indeed start to feel alienated in a society where they are looked upon as mysterious black-robed creatures, to be pitied and handled with care. Burqa bans will only end up doing this, besides driving the women who wear the burqa only reluctantly, back into their homes, depriving them of any freedom they may have had.

To which oukti asma echoes with a comprehensive “clarification” [Fr], coming to the conclusion that:

Le voile intégral est un réflexe identitaire, très minoritaire des musulmans de France.
Les parlementaires n'ont donc pas à se mêler de cette affaire, car celui-ci est et restera très marginale en France.
C'est aux musulmans d'expliquer à cette petite frange de la communauté, les aspects que nous avons cités ( des origines non-islamiques, les inconvéniants liés, la compatibilté de l'acsèse avec le monde actuel)
Je rajouterai qu'il ne faut pas prendre les membres de la communauté musulmane pour des abrutis. Et je m'adresse tant au non-musulmans qu'aux musulmans.
Les musulmans en France sont instruits, et savent majoritairement faire la part des choses. (…)

However, mainstream media, such as Le Monde, published op-eds of varying opinion.  French writer Pierrette Fleutiaux's ironic-–or all-too serious-–text entitled “Man's dignity requires him to wear the burqa” was re-posted by at least a dozen blogs. She carefully and wittily turns every argument for this piece of clothing on its male supporters [Fr].

Repoussons cette croyance absurde qu'il faudrait voiler les femmes pour que les hommes ne soient pas portés à désirer celles d'autrui. Une telle croyance est mécréante : elle accrédite l'idée que l'homme a été créé libidineux, violeur par nature et faible devant ses désirs. Et que, devant toute femme passant sous ses yeux, s'éveille aussitôt en lui la pulsion de lui sauter sur le râble pour consommer l'oeuvre de chair. L'homme a en lui la force de l'âme et le respect naturel de l'ordre divin. L'homme n'a rien à craindre des misérables appâts de la femme.

Que la femme aille dans la rue dans les atours aguicheurs qu'elle ne manquera pas de se choisir. Son regard s'épuisera sur les autres femmes, elle y verra comme dans un miroir sa propre indécence, sa futilité même la détournera de toute compétition malsaine avec l'homme. Quant à cette exposition de la féminité, elle ne saurait nuire à l'homme. Il s'y verra conforté dans son incontestable supériorité. Il saura, dans les autres burqas, reconnaître les hommes pieux et respectueux de la loi, et ainsi renforcera nécessairement la belle et indispensable communauté masculine.

Researcher Farhad Khosrokhavar, from EHESS, worries that a ban might actually end up bolstering the more fundamentalist groups of Islam in France. His article can be read here [Fr].

Whatever the arguments, the debate was renewed on Sunday when news came that Lubna Ahmed Al-Hussein, a young Sudanese journalist working for the UN Mission in Sudan (Unmis), had been arrested, along with a dozen fellow countrywomen, some of them from non-Muslim south Sudan, during a party at a Khartoum restaurant for wearing trousers under their Islamic veil. Most of were released after a flogging; three are being taken to court and face a sentence of 40 lashes and a fine.  Loubna Ahmed Al-Hussein denied the diplomatic immunity she is entitled to as a UN worker, saying that she wants the trial to go to its end. Arab human rights activists, as well as some journalists, think the Sudanese regime «wants to smash a free pen», as she used to write a column in a non-governmental newspaper.

Some French bloggers did not fail to draw a parallel with the burqa issue.

Rimbus blog focuses on the necessary reciprocity of tolerance [Fr]:

Mais sur le fond, il s'agit de la même chose. Le pays occidental veut condamner l'expression d'une pensée qu'il combat, la dictature musulmane condamne l'expression du mode de vie occidental.

La seule position honorable pour la France serait de tolérer officiellement ces 400 femmes voilées intégralement, au nom de la liberté de pensée, et fort de ce principe, condamner vigoureusement l'attitude de Khartoum, par voie diplomatique et officielle. Dans le cas contraire, nous ne pourrions qu'accepter une réaction du pouvoir soudanais, comparable à la notre.

Il faut soutenir la journaliste soudanaise Loubna Ahmed al-Hussein, et laisser les femmes s'habiller librement, en mini-jupe comme en niqab, en garçon si elles le souhaitent.

Allain Jules, writing on collective blogging website agoravox, is more scathing and wonders why the case did not draw more attention [Fr]:

La journaliste indique qu’elle en a assez du silence des femmes de son pays qui se laissent flageller pour rien. Ainsi, elle a déclaré : « Des milliers de femmes sont châtiées à coups de fouet mais elles restent silencieuses. La loi est utilisée pour harceler les femmes et je veux dénoncer cela ». Courageuse, elle est donc prête à subir ce châtiment. (…) Il est d’ailleurs étonnant de ne pas voir les défenseurs des droits de l’homme se lancer à corps perdu dans ce combat pour les droits des femmes. Mais où sont-ils passés ? Sont-ils plus préoccupés par leurs petits intérêts et trouvent ridicule le combat de cette femme courage ?

First on my discovery list was Denise Bombardier, a journalist, novelist, essayist and media personality from Quebec, well known for her outstanding reporting and often scathing sense of humour. In «Nos hommes» (1995) she writes, as quoted in Nicole Savard's literary blog [Fr]:

Les hommes sont, dit-elle, des êtres qui nous inspirent sur chacun d'eux, chacun d'eux étant la facette de ce qu'est un autre. De plus, l'homme est cette personne qui nous révèle à nous-mêmes, nous les femmes. Ils sont un peu ce que nous voulons qu'ils soient: amoureux, amants, fougueux, touchants, amicaux, professionnels, séducteurs, parfois cruels, et souvent terrifiés par le pouvoir qu'exerce la femme sur eux. Enfin, ces hommes sont à l'image de ce que la femme veut, croit ou “désespère d'être”.

Camille Laurens [Fr] represents a controversial trend in French literature, called «autofiction», combining autobiography and fiction. In 2000, she published «Dans ces bras-là» («In those arms»), which earned her the Femina prize, a book ballerines ou converses loved [Fr]:

Les hommes. Quel sujet ! Passionnant. Je regrette d’avoir été une femme en lisant ces lignes. J’aurais aimé être masculin pour mieux comprendre ce qui se passe dans le ventre des femmes face à nous, mais je suis fille, je ne fais qu’aquièscer au chemin chaotique et amoureux de l’héroïne. Car il y a toujours une histoire d’amour avec un homme : qu’il soit père, grand-père, fils, frère, ami, amant, mari, patron, collègue.

But my favorite is no doubt My Men by Malika Mokkedem, an Algerian writer established in France, where she studied medicine and long practised as a nephrologist, before deciding to dedicate her time to literature.
The daughter of an illiterate, formely nomadic family of South Algeria, she succeeded in wrestling her independent life against the heavy traditions of the time and her family, and through the sheer power of her determination, became what she irrepressibly craved to be. She writes [Fr]:

I left my father to learn how to love men, a continent still hostile, because it is a foreign one…. I made myself with and against them. They embody everything I needed to conquer, in order to attain freedom.

La muse agitée, the blogger of the Vallauris bookshop, is enthusiastic [Fr]:

Voici le « carnet de bal » de Malika Mokkedem, qui déroule le fil de sa vie comme on ouvre un tiroir aux souvenirs. Y sont rangés son enfance de petite fille algérienne qui compte moins que ses frères et à qui on demande d’être la plus transparente possible, son adolescence de jeune fille qui trouve dans les livres et l’instruction une porte ouverte à la liberté, une jeune femme avide d’amour, indépendante et déterminée, une femme construite avec ses blessures, sa culture, sa rage et son besoin viscéral de reconnaissance.
Les hommes de sa vie sont ceux qui ont compté et l’on soutenue, ceux avec qui elle a bataillé, contre qui elle a dormi, pour qui elle a fait l'amour. Leurs traces intimes imprègnent de forces conjuguées et de déceptions cuisantes la vie de l’auteur. […]

Le livre se lit comme un récit de vie, un témoignage, une confidence, une sorte de gifle à l’ordre établi, l’ignorance et la servitude, une vérité toute crue qui n’accuse pas mais enveloppe l’avenir d’un espoir encourageant pour les femmes algériennes. […]

This obstacle race facing women leads us to great Algerian novelist Assia Djebar, who is also a translator, filmmaker and a professor of Francophone literature at New York University, one of the few women ever accepted into the Académie Française. Among her most famous works and memorable reads are L'Amour, la Fantasia (1985), and Femmes d'Alger dans leur appartement (2002). On his blog Le bateau libre, literary critic Frédéric Ferney points, about her latest book Nulle part dans la maison de mon père («Nowhere in my father's house», 2007) [Fr]:

Le titre sonne comme une dénégation et un aveu, il tient sa promesse.
[…]
Grandir, est-ce apprendre à désobéir? Et comment grandir sans (se) trahir? Comment être fidèle à soi sans renier les siens? Assia Djebar a cette phrase: “Se dire à soi-même adieu” que chacun est libre d'interpréter comme il veut.

What brings together most of French-language Algerian writers is their style, their rich and vivid, energetic and never starchy handling of language, as well as the audacity of their subjects. So, finally somehow drifting from women's destinies, I feel compelled to end this short round-up with the entrancing books of Yasmina Khadra (a pen name for a man, to avoid military censorship during the Agerian civil war), whose Wolf Dreams (1999), The Swallows of Kaboul (2002) The Attack and The Sirens of Baghdad (both 2006), among others, aim to «give the readers in the West a chance to understand the core a problem that he usually only touches on the surface [that is, fanaticism].

More about this fascinating writer on these blogs : Un oeil sur la planète, and Cocola's [Fr].

What is Boiro Camp?

Camp Boiro is the former barracks of the Republican guards in Donka, a suburb of Conakry, Guinea, it became a political prison and torture block from 1958 to 1984. All people accused by the revolutionary regime of Ahmed Sekou Touré, rightly or wrongly, of misdeeds, counter-revolutionary activities, middle-class attitude etc, were locked up and more often than not, executed, after all kinds of humiliation and tortures [Fr] including fatal privation of food and water (a torture called “diète noire” black fast),electroshocks, sexual violences, etc. According to international human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, over 50.000 [Fr] lost their lives in Camp Boiro and similar places in Guinea. Mass graves are still being found all around Guinea.

Could you please state in which context this took place?
In 1958, the former colonial power, France, held a referendum offering African people a choice between staying within the frame of a French-African Community, or opting for independence. Guinea alone decided for independence at that time, which it got. France retaliated by severing all ties and investments, destroying buildings, and isolating Guinea. The leader of the Guinean splinter group of Rassemblement Démocratique Africain (“African Democratic Rally”), Ahmed Sékou Touré, a former trade unionist, embodied the African intellectuals and youth's ideals. A national union government was set up. Left wing intellectuals, Guineans from abroad, flocked home, wishing to help the young nation. But very soon the dream became a nightmare.

Sekou Touré set up a pyramidal political system, with a party cell in every village, city area, military barracks, school. Everywhere Guineans were to be found, they had to create one, even abroad. Each and every Guinean citizen was a «party member from birth to death». The whole country turned into a giant prison, called by some media a “Tropical goulag” [Fr]. To get out of Guinea, you needed an exit visa signed by the dictator himself, individually. A militia was created [Fr] and denouncement took hold, even within families.

On which grounds were people arrested and jailed in Camp Boiro ?

Any pretext was good enough to arrest and torture : an identity check while exiting a movie theatre, student protests, having a wife or a villa that appealed to a lord of the regime, etc. Most of the time, you were arrested without reason. In her memoir, «Grain de Sable” , Ms Nadine Barry recalls how she tried with her husband (who died in jail) to hide a bottle-opener whose handle sported an effigy of General de Gaulle, by burying it in their garden. Unfortunately, the heavy rains of Conakry unearthed it.

Has what went on in Camp Boiro been documented?

Global view of Camp Boiro - the arrow points to the location of the political prison block. Photo campboiro.org

A few books describe the conditions of detention in the camp [Fr]. The new prisoners were « conditionned », left for a few days without food and drink, then tried by the investigation committee. Without knowing for what the committee reproached them, they were asked to give away their accomplices, beaten, tortured with mechanical devices, forced to keep painful positions, cigarette butts were extinguished on their body, etc, until fainting or death. For days, they were asked to confess imaginary crimes : spying for the CIA or the French, receiving bribes, being a “fifth column agent”. As long as the victim did not confess, tortures did not stop. The confessions were then read by the victim on the radio, and were used to give a semblance of rationality for other arrests.

In 1976, Sekou Touré declared war on the Peul ethnic group [Fr], 40% of the nation's population. A brutal repression brought into prisons and graves thousands of innocent people, including the archbishop of Conakry, Mgr Raymond-Marie Tchidimbo [Fr].
An estimated third of the population had left the country when Sékou Touré died in 1984.

You are yourself Peul. How was your family affected by the repression?

One morning, in April 1971, in Rome, I told my wife that I had dreamt of my father being arrested. I didn't attach any importance to this. He never went to school and did not nurture any political ambition. But I had not been living in Guinea under the revolution for ten years. I believed more than ever in our revolution. It was simply unconceivable for me to think that it could arrest and jail any innocent person. I woke up one day, at the Guinean embassy in Rome, when the ambassador harassed me, calling me “a son of fifth column”.

Only later did I learn that my father had been arrested the very night of my dream, during the compulsory weekly party meeting - if a citizen didn't attend, he was not entitled his food ration.
My father was killed at Camp Boiro, but we do not exactly know when. Most probably during the night of October 17, 1971. He may have been tortured until his spine got broken, and “sacrificed” the same day. Sekou Touré's sorcerer is rumored to have advised the dictator to sacrifice a number of people with light complexion that day. Unfortunately, in Guinea, we Peul people are considered light-skinned.

What became of you and your family ?

My family was ordered to abandon our properties, and left only with what they were wearing. My mama, wanting to take her prayer-mat, was violently hurled in the staircase. Before independence, my father was a wealthy businessman. He had sent his father on a pilgrimage to Mecca and bought his first car (a Citroën sedan) in 1949. He started off by selling salt, which he carried on foot from the coast in the beginning, and traded it for kinkeliba, a local tea much liked in Guinea. His money and possessions were “nationalized”, by the same people who murdered him. After my father disappeared in Camp Boiro, friends kept clear from our family, for fear of being arrested as accomplices. Only one of my uncle gave the family shelter in his home.

The militia arrested my mama too, charging her with knowing my brother's whereabouts. She was released and she crossed the border with Sierra Leone on foot, risking her life, to be with him. From there, they had to flee again, to Ivory Coast, as the Sierra Leone regime supported Sekou Touré. We elder children fled the country. That is why today, my sisters and brothers are Canadian, French, American, Austrian, Italian and Senegalese citizens.

Are Guineans aware today of what was going on in Camp Boiro?

Unfortunately, in Guinea, the rightful « duty of memory » is hampered by an information gap. The country lacks education, training facilities. Cyber activism is also very limited, due to poor Internet connexion, electric power shortages, low incomes. Guinean history was falsified by the torturers and nostalgics of the so-called revolution. They praise the dictator's memory, Sekou Touré, who died in 1984 (in Cleveland, USA). His successor, military Chief of staff Lansana Conté, followed his tracks. Up to the death of Lansana Comté, last Christmas Eve, Sekou Touré's memory was celebrated every year by the government senior officials. The country’s presidential palace is named after him. Sékoutoureya means Sékou Touré's house.

This why the Association des victimes, set up by survivors and children of the victims, works at locating mass graves, returning the remains to their families, rehabilitating the victims, claiming possessions seized by the State. Our aim is to turn the Camp Boiro into a Memorial (for some photos of the camp, taken in 1999, see here) dedicated to the memory of the victims, especially the cabine technique “technical booth” where inmates were tortured, and the “Death's head”, where they were executed.

Since President Comté died, another coup has taken place in Guinea.

A bloodless military coup, this time, which brought to the presidency Captain Moussa Dadis Camara. He is educated, he was trained in a democratic country, and he is young enough not to be involved with former regimes. Our hopes for justice got a strong boost on March 24th, when the new President officially received members of our association in Conakry. The meeting was broadcast on national TV. During this meeting, President Dadis Camara asked forgiveness from the members of our Association and revealed that his own father was among the victims. While an encouraging development, however, this is only a first step in a longer process to reach national reconciliation.

Interview carried out on March 27.

[…] En l'absence de l'accusé, le procès auquel la Ligue française des droits de l'homme et la Fédération internationale des droits de l'homme (FIDH) s'étaient constituée parties civiles a aussi été celui du système mis en place par le président Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, au pouvoir depuis vingt et un ans. Plusieurs témoins ont dressé un portrait au vitriol du régime tunisien où, selon eux, la torture est érigée en “pratique d'Etat”.

[…] In the defendant's absence, the trial, in which the [Human Rights Organizations] Ligue française des droits de l'homme (LDH) and Fédération internationale des ligues des droits de l'homme (FIDH) brought an independant action for damages, was also the trial of the system established by President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who has been in power for 21 years. Several witnesses drew a vitriolic picture of the Tunisian regime, where, according to them, torture is made a state practice

These testimonies eventually gained the court's conviction, although the French state's representative had called for acquittal, stressing the utter lack of evidence in the record.
“This is a further advance in the fight against torturers' impunity and a strong signal to Tunisian authorities ; torturers, if safe in Tunisia, are no longer so in other countries”, commented the Human Rights Organizations' lawyer.
In a further post, Tunisia Watch adds :

Khaled ben Saïd qui fait l'objet d'un mandat d'arrêt international depuis 2002 n'a pas la possibilité de faire appel puisque l'audience s'est déroulée sans lui. Toutefois s'il est arrêté, il sera rejugé. Au-delà de la peine prononcée soit 8 ans de RC, c'est-à-dire en décembre 2016, il y aura prescription.

Khaled ben Saïd, who is subject to an international arrest warrant since 2002, is in no position to appeal, as the trial was held without his being there. However, if he gets arrested, he will be tried again. Beyond the time of delivered sentenced, namely eight years of criminal imprisonment, i.e. in December 2016, there will be prescription.

Earlier in the day, the Tunisian authorities had denounced the trial as a “complete fabrication” and further said that “claiming torture would be a tolerated practice in Tunisia pertains to dishonesty and
disinformation”.

Nawaat.org portal is a tad bit skeptical while wondering whether the taboo about torture in Tunisia is on the way to being lifted. The blog quotes CNRS researcher Vincent Geissler, who told during the hearings :

“En Tunisie, sous Ben Ali, on torture au nom des droits de l’homme et on viole les femmes en invoquant le droit des femmes”, a également expliqué devant la cour Vincent Geissier. Cette pratique “est destinée à humilier et à diffuser la peur”. Avant d’ajouter : le recours à la torture, “c’est un mode de contrôle de la société”.

“In Tunisia, under Ben Ali, they torture for the sake of human rights and they rape women while putting forward women's rights”, also explained Vincent Geissler to the court. “This practice is devised to humiliate and to spread fear”. Before adding : “it is a way of controling society”

.

Readers voiced their various opinions (Fr.) in the comments section of the local website of newspaper Libération and at leJDD.fr.

One (optimistic) pick :

Rédigé par: GDP : Comme quoi, n'en déplaise à Sarkozy, la justice progresse davantage en France que les droits de l'homme en Tunisie.

GDP : Which just goes to show that, wether Sarkozy likes it or not, justice makes better progress in France than human rights in Tunisia.

In this video ad for the orchestra, Chinese composer Tan Dun (Remember the film, “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”?) and many other musicians beckon: “Join us!”. The appeal is available in more than a dozen languages.

Play your part in music history and join the YouTube Symphony Orchestra. You just need to upload two videos: your contribution to the Tan Dun piece and a general audition video.

Good luck!

Here is how it works.

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3. Entries - Browse videos to get ideas and check out the competition.

Professional musicians will make a first pre-selection, before a vote by the YouTube audience takes place in February 2009. The objective is a real life performance, due to take place at Carnegie Hall, in New York, on April 15, 2009, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, musical director of the San Francisco Orchestra.

Now to your instruments, and go!