OPERATION DOVE REPORT
Nonviolent peace corps (Association Community Pope John XXIII)
Updates from Projects
COLOMBIA
General situation
Few days before volunteers left for Italy two murders occurred near San Josè de Apartadò. All members of the Council were out in a vereda for an important meeting and this added to the alarm in the Community. Volunteers hoped they could serve in another accompaniment during the few days left, but members of the Council asked them to stay in San Josesito and be at disposal for short accompaniments, especially on the way to and from the city of San Josè.
It looks like things are worsening since armed actors are more and more often in the area of San Josè. A Police Office and Army Command have been present in the city for few years now, apparently with the goal of protect and warrant civil safety. What happens though is that various family have displaced themselves because of the threatens they received. Many families in the community had the same treatment, but they don’t want to leave, they want to stay and fight in the name of the ideals for which the Peace Community was born. Many short accompaniments took place during the last days of presence. While accompanying H., a member of the counsel, two policemen were about to approach him in a bank, but as soon as they spot volunteers they desisted from their idea.
During another accompaniment J.E. and his son were searched by soldiers on a check point, together with one volunteers who had got closer to listen to soldiers questioning. During the last days volunteers met again colonel Diaz of Brigade XVII and colonel Rojas of Battallon Voltigeros, to reinforce the presence in the area and make them now OD work with the Peace Community.
After leaving the community one week was spent in Bogotà, where new meetings with institutions representatives took place. Volunteers eventually left for Italy to verify what was done so far, and willing to be back as soon as possible with people of the Peace Community of San Josè de Apartadò.
KOSOVO
General situation
Dicembre was marked by the second ballot in various municipalities in Kosovo. No big surprises. Kosovo remains a state under construction, apparently stable.
Study group
Study group activity has been quite weak in the last months, low attendance and low interests, as if ideas would fall from the sky instead of building them. In this light a two days meeting off all members is summoned for January in order to face the situation and decide whether the group has to keep going if the enthusiasm is so low.
Conflict equipe
Contribution of S. and M. to the Youth Point is more and more precious. The idea for new years is to step on. Up to now youths have committed to keep it open, the moment is coming for them to propose activities.
Soccer matches are going on well, there was a dinner at the end of the year who was highly participated, even though the two groups (Goraždevac and Poqestë) still stay on their own mainly. Eventually, three youths from the group spent two weeks in Israeli-Palestine as Operation Dove volunteers, a tough but educating experience.
Pristina
After two months of activity in the Art Faculty the exhibition was held in the main road of the city: ART FOR EVERYBODY, NO BORDERS. It was a simple exhibition but yet pleased everybody in the group. Thanks to papers, radios and tv stations it was visible in all Kosovo and interviews showed the message in the right light. This opens hopes for the next future activities, since it is possible to find ways to convey strong messages to this “new independent Kosovo”. Despite invitation youths from Serbian villages did not come. We are sorry, but actually it was maybe better this way ‘cause medias were not expected and there could have been a risk of manipulation.
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
General situation
December was a challenging month for At-Tuwani area inhabitants. One night volunteers get a call from a shepherd from Maghayir Al Abeed, an isolated village in a desert area close to an IDF military base. They report that about 50 soldiers on 10 means of transport occupied the village at night time, forced villagers out of their caves and tents and used them for a square-bashing lasted about half an hour, while helicopters flew over the area. It happens again the following night in At-Tuwani. At 4.15 am soldiers enter some houses to check documents of those dwelling there. When they find out the presence of international volunteers, armed with videocameras they are apparently surprised and leave the village in a short time. Shepherds have been taking advantage of the rain season to graze their flocks and settlers have been quite active in getting out of their outpost and calling the Army to move away the shepherds.
It looks like some plots of lands in the valley of Umm Zeituna are lost for good since settlers succeeded in growing there, while others, even very close to the settlement of Ma’on are still in the hand of villagers.
School patrol was once again not reliable, kids from Tuba and Maghayir Al Abeed had often to wait long for the escort both in the morning and the afternoon. In the morning kids find themselves alone and very close to the settlement, which exposes them to the risk of being harassed. On Dec 30th: they waited for an hour leaving a settler the time to manage a masked pursue of the kids armed with a sling. The following day kids were chased again in the afternoon by the security man of the settlement.
The accompaniment of kids to the school of Al Fakheit did not go any better. On Dec 10th a wonderful and participated march took place. It was organized by the Non-violent Resistance Committee. Several Palestinian kids, men and women, international volunteers, Israeli activists and reporters walked from At-Tuwani to Al Fakheit to draw the attention on this small school in the desert. After ten days the army stopped the car used to collect kids from nearby villages, confiscated it and destroyed because, they reported, documents were not regular. Since then kids have been walking to school without internationals accompaniment. During the month members of Conflict Group from Kosovo together with Operation Dove volunteers in Kosovo spent 15 days in Palestine-Israel. It was a deep exchange of experiences between two groups who are living in a conflict. Hopefully a video-documentary will be available. A numerous Italian delegation from Rete Radie Resh visited the village at the end of the month. Such visits are really important to people there because they make them feel they are not forgotten.
CASTEL VOLTURNO
Some migrants met in Caste Volturno had told us about the terrible situation they experienced in Rosarno. We therefore knew that the city is one of the important point of the internal dislocation of migrants, because of the seasonal citrus harvest. We decided to go there. What we saw showed us a situation parallel but different from the one we were coming from. They are both areas were the migrants are not the only poor; areas where organized criminality has deep roots and where, in 2008, attacked directly some migrants; areas were many migrants don’t have VISA.
What is different is that if in Castel Volturno the presence of relative high numbers of empty houses allow migrants to rent them, in Rosarno there is no such availability, thus forcing many to live in slum and abandoned factories. When we went there people were living in different camps, with no electricity, running water or heating. Some in tents, some in barracks of paper and plastic, some merely sleeping on paper. The working day is from dawn to twilight, 25 € a day, less than 3 € per hour. Black work, no insurance, no certainty of being paid that very day and the following. And what can you do if your exploiter does not pay you? You can’t call the police, because you’ll get expelled. They told us they had days they could not buy food; they told us there were people hostile to them; there is no need to say anything about local authorities indifference. From June 2009 a network of associations have started to take care of some primary needs of these people, handing out food and blankets, lobbying the municipality to have some toilets installed and to sanitize some of the places they were living in.
Visiting that place was really upsetting, we got to know that slums actually do exist in Italy. We saw in Rosarno a condition beyond what we could have imagined, a housing, health and humanitarian emergency in a country which is between the richest in the world and that is a democracy. Please, don’t tell that it has become something normal for few years! We have been particularly stricken by one place: a big abandoned building facing a very crowded road. 300 migrants were living there, in the mud, and thousand indifferent drivers went by everyday.
We felt a lot of indifference, at some point hate. We know Calabria as a real hospital place, like the whole Italy. Why is there such a difference of hospitality towards different group of people?
Photos: http://www.operazionecolomba.com/galleries/castelvolturno/2009/foto%20rosarno/
