[Pnews] Today’s activists should heed the story of Assata Shakur
Prisoner News
ppnews at freedomarchives.org
Mon Jul 21 16:15:39 EDT 2014
Today’s activists should heed the story of Assata Shakur
*http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jul/21/activists-assata-shakur-state-surveillance-innocent*
Kwesi Shaddai <http://www.theguardian.com/profile/kwesi-shaddai>
Monday 21 July 2014 09.30 EDT
State surveillance is justified by saying ‘the innocent have nothing to
fear’, but renewed attempts to capture Shakur show we cannot be complacent
When the FBI announced last year that Assata Shakur had been placed on
the most-wanted terrorist list
<http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jul/13/assata-shakur-civil-rights-activist-fbi-most-wanted>
at the age of 65, it felt like a new generation of activists was being
given a glimpse of what happened during the heyday of the US
counterintelligence programme. The security service clearly still has
confidence in our complacency, and given the revelations about the
extent of today’s state surveillance, that confidence, appears well-placed.
In the UK, we now know that the British police have been conducting a
counterintelligence programme
<http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/mar/14/protester-wins-surveillance-fight>
against members of the public they labelled “domestic extremists” for
years. During that time, thousands of activists were monitored by
undercover officers and informants. We also know that both GCHQ and the
NSA are involved in data-mining on a vast scale, with the Tempora and
Prism programmes being two examples that we know of. Last week, the data
retention and investigatory powers (Drip) bill was cynically pushed
through parliament in one day
<http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/16/emergency-surveillance-bill-clears-commons>,
without members having sufficient time to scrutinise its contents.
Predictably, growing public concern about state surveillance is
dismissed with the familiar mantra that “the innocent have nothing to
fear”. Of course, history has told us a very different story.
Assata: An Autobiography by Shakur, republished this month
<http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jul/13/assata-shakur-civil-rights-activist-fbi-most-wanted>,
underlines the extent to which she was targeted by Cointelpro, the
secret counterintelligence programme.
In the early 1970s, FBI director J Edgar Hoover spent the final years of
his life intensifying the campaign against all political activists
considered a domestic threat. As a founding member of the Black
Liberation Army and former Black Panther, Shakur was targeted and
falsely accused in six different criminal cases; all of which she was
either acquitted from, or the charges were dismissed.
However, in 1973 she faced a seventh case for the murder of a New Jersey
state trooper, and spent the next four years in custody awaiting trial –
two of which were spent in solitary confinement within two separate
men’s prisons.
Controversially, though the prosecution failed to refute any of the
evidence that established her innocence, Shakur was convicted in 1977 by
a jury filled with relatives, partners and friends of state troopers,
and sentenced to life imprisonment. She escaped from prison two years
later, and claimed asylum in Cuba under international law as a victim of
persecution for her political beliefs. She has remained in exile as a
political refugee ever since.
This infamous chain of events was presented as the rationale behind the
$2m bounty offered by the FBI and the state of New Jersey in 2013. US
authorities still allege that Assata “opened fire”, despite FBI
forensics showing <http://www.assatashakur.com/facts.htm> that she
didn’t handle any weapon found at the scene. Furthermore, ballistics
evidence established that trooper Harper shot Assata twice, and the
trajectory of the first bullet proved that she was surrendering with
both hands in the air at the time. Harper fired the second bullet into
Assata’s back.
Thanks to the Church Committee
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Committee> of the 1970s, we now
know that the US government was covertly targeting thousands of innocent
people, including Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Fred Hampton and Zayd
Shakur. State agents and informants helped to persecute countless other
activists, such as Mumia Abu Jamal, Geronimo Ji Jaga, Sundiata Acoli and
the Angola Three
<http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/feb/28/forty-years-injustice-angola-three>.
Although evidence of criminality was never a prerequisite for
“neutralisation”, many innocent victims of Cointrelpro still remain in
prison today, serving terms that effectively amount to death sentences.
This history of systematic injustice provides the real context for
Shakur’s conviction and subsequent escape from prison, and explains why
the Cuban government continues to grant her political asylum. When we
acknowledge the scale of surveillance and covert policing that we face
today, the FBI’s renewed attempt to “recapture” Assata should disturb
every single one of us.
In an age of austerity and inequality, what are the implications of
individuals being targeted for their political beliefs? Fifty-thousand
people marched against government cuts last month, and up to a million
joined public sector strikes on 10 July
<http://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2014/jul/10/public-sector-strike-in-pictures>.
How can we be sure that these grassroots movements are not also being
targeted by the state?
If history has shown us anything, it is that the power of the
establishment must never go unchecked. Despite the targeting of
high-profile whistleblowers such as Chelsea Manning
<http://www.theguardian.com/world/chelsea-manning> and Edward Snowden
<http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/18/-sp-edward-snowden-interview-rusbridger-macaskill>,
it is imperative that we as citizens do not live in fear of our elected
governments. Speaking last year
<http://newsone.com/2436064/angela-davis-fbi-assata-shakur/>, Dr Angela
Davis was adamant that Shakur is being targeted now because she remains
an international figure of defiance against political persecution, and a
symbol of hope.
If we allow this innocent grandmother to be dragged back to the US in
chains, what precedent are we setting ourselves for the future?
--
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/ppnews_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20140721/1e597bce/attachment.htm>
More information about the PPnews
mailing list