A man blows the whistle on WMDs in the Middle East, and is kidnapped and jailed 18 years, over 11 years in solitary confinement. Iraq under Saddam. No. Israel which has disgraced itself.
Mordechai Vanunu has spent 18 years in prison in Israel after being illegally kidnapped in Italy.
Since his release in 2004, Vanunu "was sentenced to six more months in prison for violating terms of his parole. The sentence was considered unusual even by the prosecution who expected a suspended sentence. In response, Amnesty International challenged the detention, issuing a press release on July 2, 2007, stating:
Mordechai Vanunu has spent 18 years in prison in Israel after being illegally kidnapped in Italy.
Since his release in 2004, Vanunu "was sentenced to six more months in prison for violating terms of his parole. The sentence was considered unusual even by the prosecution who expected a suspended sentence. In response, Amnesty International challenged the detention, issuing a press release on July 2, 2007, stating:
'The organization considers Mordechai Vanunu to be a prisoner of conscience and calls for his immediate and unconditional release. (from Wikipedia)'"
Writes activist Eileen Fleming:
Mordechai Vanunu was informed that the Israeli government has continued his house arrest in Jerusalem and has renewed all the restrictions against him, for the fourth time and third year of captivity in east Jerusalem.
Although 'freed' from 18 years in jail on April 21, 2004 for telling the world Israel had gone nuclear (in the London Sunday Times, October 5, 1986) Vanunu has been forbidden to leave Israel, forbidden to speak to media and to foreigners under the draconian restrictions of the Emergency Defense Regulations (EDR) which were implemented first by Britain against Palestinians and Jews after World War II.
After WWII, a leading Jewish attorney, Yaccov Shapiro, who became Israel's Minister of Justice described the EDR as 'unparalleled in any civilized country: there were no such laws in Nazi Germany.'
Israel's worse nightmare: Enforcement of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Mordechai Vanunu was informed that the Israeli government has continued his house arrest in Jerusalem and has renewed all the restrictions against him, for the fourth time and third year of captivity in east Jerusalem.
Although 'freed' from 18 years in jail on April 21, 2004 for telling the world Israel had gone nuclear (in the London Sunday Times, October 5, 1986) Vanunu has been forbidden to leave Israel, forbidden to speak to media and to foreigners under the draconian restrictions of the Emergency Defense Regulations (EDR) which were implemented first by Britain against Palestinians and Jews after World War II.
After WWII, a leading Jewish attorney, Yaccov Shapiro, who became Israel's Minister of Justice described the EDR as 'unparalleled in any civilized country: there were no such laws in Nazi Germany.'
Israel's worse nightmare: Enforcement of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
On April 7, 2008 Mordechai Vanunu, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee for the last twenty-two years learned that Israel has continued the restrictions against his right to leave the state or to speak with human beings if they are not Israeli citizens for the 5th year.
ReplyDeleteOn April 9, 2008 it was reported that now Norway has joined Sweden, Canada and Denmark in refusing asylum to Vanunu.
Norway's Bergens Tidende recorded "that Vanunu's application for asylum in Norway had in fact been approved by the country's immigration agency UDI (Utlendingsdirektoratet) back in 2004. UDI was overruled, however, by Norway's center-right government at the time. Political considerations, not least Norway's efforts to remain on good terms with Israel and the US, were more important than Vanunu's human rights." [1]
UDI officials have a mandate to make asylum decisions without political interference. UDI officials had determined that Vanunu qualified for asylum and immigration authorities had determined that his application should be granted.
Israel developed its nuclear program with the help of Norwegian heavy water and between 1976 and 1985; Vanunu was employed as a mid level technician and shift manager at the Dimona nuclear weapons facility underground in the Negev desert where it was utilized.
-WAWA Blog April 10, 2008
Promising News to ensure Nightmare for Israel as they celebrate their 60th;
PRESS RELEASE: April 14, 2008
Fredrik S. Heffermehl, Oslo
The International Vanunu Committee
ISRAELI WHISTLEBLOWER WELCOME TO NORWAY
After hectic political discussions within the three-party Norwegian coalition cabinet, the Minister of Immigration, Bjarne Hakon Hanssen, (Labor, Norway´s biggest Party) said last Friday that Mordechai Vanunu is welcome to Norway: " If he gets a job offer here, he will of course get a permit to stay and work in Norway". Vanunu is the nuclear whistleblower who has been Israel´s hostage since his kidnap by Mossad agents from London in 1986.
Confronted with the fact that Vanunu is banned from leaving Israel by government decree, a member of the cabinet, Aslaug Haga, Center Party leader and former deputy Foreign Minister, admitted that a major diplomatic effort towards Israel will be needed. Then, on Sunday night, a meeting of the National Committee of the third member party of the coalition cabinet, the Socialist Left Party, decided to invite Vanunu to come to Norway in May this year.
- This welcome to Norway does not solve Vanunu´s problem, but is a major step forward, says Fredrik S. Heffermehl, a Norwegian, for the International Vanunu Committee. Up to now our efforts to protect Vanunu´s elementary human rights have received only cold shoulders. After 21 1/2 years the brutalit inhumanity against Vanunu has to stop. Since a secret deterrent is ineffective, Vanunu did Israel a service by documenting the nuclear weapons program. Israel´s illtreatment of him is totally meaningless, unfair and unacceptable from a state laying claim to be a democracy under the rule of law, Heffermehl says.
Vanunu has been exposed to severe inhumanity and human rights violations for 21 1/2 years, first the kidnap, then a secret trial, then 11 1/2 years in strict isolation, and then - at the end of his full sentence - he was not free, but subjected to additional punishment, bans on travel and talk, a grave violation of his basic freedoms under international treaties. Vanunu has done more for a nuclear free world than most of us, and has suffered more for his principled action against an illegal weapon, our
The political breakthrough for Vanunu, with the three-party coalition government, followed a brilliant piece of investigative journalism, where Vidar Ystad, one of Norway´s finest political journalists uncovered that since 2005 The Norwegian Immigration Authority has held the view that Vanunu fulfilled all requirements for political asylum in Norway and, further, that the former conservative government of Kjell Magne Bondevik had broken the law when its Minister of Immigration, Erna Solberg, presentleader of the Conservative Party, interfered to stop the Immigration Authority from granting asylum to Vanunu.
A former leader of the Conservative party, Kare Willoch, has been adamant that Norway must grant asylum to Vanunu, and a former leader of Labor, now President of Parliament, Thorbjorn Jagland, stated in 2005 that Norway´s Mid-East diplomacy should not bar the country from speaking up for Vanunu.
Fredrik S. Heffermehl, the International Vanunu Committee
For further information: fredpax@online.no ,
phone: +47 2244 8003 (cell phone: +47 917 44 783).
www.vanunu.org, ("Updates") gives access to a legal briefs by US lawyers, my report on the decision against Vanunu in Israel´s Supreme Court etc.
Fredrik S. Heffermehl
* Fredrik S. HEFFERMEHL
* N. Juels g. 28 A, N-0272 Oslo, Norway
* Phone +47-2244 8003 (Cell: +47 9174 4783)
* E-mail: fredpax@online.no
* NFR: www.nowar.no or IPB: www.ipb.org
* Hon. President, Norwegian Peace Alliance
* Ex Vice President, International Peace Bureau
* Vice Pres, Intntl. Assn. Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms
* International Free Vanunu Committee
Eileen Fleming, Reporter and Editor WAWA:
http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Author "Keep Hope Alive" and "Memoirs of a Nice Irish American 'Girl's' Life in Occupied Territory"
Producer "30 Minutes With Vanunu" and "13 Minutes with Vanunu"