The bottom line, then, is that we do not fit this definition of an indigenous people — and for good reason; it was not written with us in mind. Scotland is a developed European nation, and Scots are the dominant ethnic or people group in Scotland. In the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples the UN uses ‘indigenous people’ to mean a people or ethnic group subject to colonisation or settler-colonisation in a situation in which they are dominated by the coloniser group in their own territory.
Catalunya: The Failure of European Democracy
The truth is that Spain has narrowly avoided an armed conflict in Catalunya, and no country has done more to provoke a war in Europe in recent decades than has Spain in Catalunya. Thanks mainly, we can be sure, to the misguided trust of the Catalan leadership in the honest brokerage of the EU and the European states this has not happened. Yet, now having learned this lesson, we cannot be certain that any similar event will end so “peacefully.”
One Million Rally for Catalunya
The situation, while on the surface like a carnival, is tense. It is understood that any violence – or perceived violence – whatsoever, on the part of the pro-independence movement, will likely result in a full military intervention by Madrid. This is what happens when those with the power have no options left, and Spain has nothing left to play but force.
Our Christmas Present from the United Nations
In the real world – a place both Netanyahu and Danon are ill at ease – we have to deal with real people and their real rights and claims. In the real world gods don’t act as guarantors. Laws do. In this case we have the current position of international law and the reality of Palestine and Israel as real and existing states with rights.
True Solidarity does not come with Strings Attached
Zionist organizations are willing to reject the current battle for Black lives raging in the United States when its activists find common ground and solidarity with Palestinians simply reaffirms what we already knew: Zionism is racism.
US and British Privatisation and Financialisation of War
In recent decades the United States has forced a distinction between “private military contractors” and hired mercenaries that is both a legal fiction and more a work of art than law.
Is Abortion A Human Right?
The State acknowledges the right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.
The Occupation is Murder with Impunity
Israel has no basis in international law for describing legitimate resistence as ‘terrorism.’ In fact the boot is on the other foot; while Palestinians have every right to resist, Israel is the aggressor state engaged in a process of terrorising a civilian population.
Random Public Journal 