JAPAN: GUILTY OF DOING GOOD

Guilty Of Doing Good

“Every man is guilty of all the good he didn’t do” Voltaire

From the narrow window of my small cell,
I see trees that are smiling at me
and rooftops crowded with my family.
And windows weeping and praying for me.
From the narrow window of my small cell--
I can see your big cell!

Samih al-Qasim, from “End of a talk with a jailer”

Here in Tokyo, Japan, 3 peace activists, Toshiyuki Obora, Nobuhiro Onishi and Sachimi Takada were found guilty on April 11, 2008 by the Supreme Court of putting anti-war fliers into the mail boxes of the families of the Japanese soldiers who were dispatched to Irak on the orders of Uncle Sam to assist the shameful U.S.-led coalition in its illegal invasion and occupation of Irak to free it of its oil.

For a detailed account of this injustice, please read these articles by David McNeill in The Japan Times and on Japan Focus:
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20060214zg.html
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fl20080520zg.html
http://www.japanfocus.org/_David_McNeill-Martyrs_for_Peace__Japanese_antiwar_activists_jailed_for_trespassing_in_SDF_compound_vow_to_fight_on
(with the interview)

These 3 activists were found guilty, their actions were found illegal for opposing an illegal war in which their country has taken part.

" The decision by President George W. Bush to go to war in Iraq was ILLEGAL because it didn't have U.N Security Council approval, according to Secretary General Kofi Annan in an interview with the BBC World Service on Wednesday 15 2004. On Wednesday after being asked three times whether the lack of council approval for the war meant it was illegal, he (Annan) said: " From our point of view it was ILLEGAL."

The crime I’m writing about is of course the rape of Irak by the of course U.S.-led coalition of the willing to kill and plunder. These 3 activists did jail time, 75 days, for opposing an illegal war that has led to the death of over 1 million Irakis, and counting, to rob them of their oil! And the criminals who have caused their death, who have taken part in this Supreme International Crime are prancing around free.

To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole. Robert H. Jackson, 1945-46

A student of mine the other day here in Tokyo was all excited and happy because she went to the Opera and there, guess who she saw enjoying Don Giovanni? Koizumi himself! Koizumi is the former Prime Minister of Japan and a war criminal since he has led his country into this illegal war on Irak. There he was, at the Opera, enjoying Don Giovanni while Irak is burning and bleeding! I feel rage burning inside me while writing this piece.

The 3 activists were found guilty by a judicial system of a country whose government, ignoring the will of the majority of its people opposed to the war, has taken part in the Supreme International Crime. They, who are opposed to this illegal war, were found guilty by a lackey judge who is an accomplice in this illegal war. Could anyone really expect anything else than a guilty verdict?

What is the Left that lives in the belly of the beast doing about this?

I once wrote a piece advocating the inclusion of violence as one method among others used by us on the Left to fight against whatever capitalist and imperialist institution and their leaders is promoting the horrible, horrible kind of crime against humanity that is taking place in Irak before our greedy eyes.

I sent my piece to a socialist website on which I was a kind of a regular and was banned from it soon after. I was told that the kind of actions I had in mind to fight against the illegal actions of our Western imperialist governments (including Japan) would be … illegal.

“It is the collective responsibility of the citizens in a modernState to ensure by all means necessary that its governmentadheres to the rule of law, not just domestically but internationally”. Karl Jaspers


Brkic Sulejman