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history

Undying Guardians of the North

Undying Guardians of the North

Part lion, part dragon. These ancient, mythical guardians protect a temple, Wat Mahawan, in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Photographs by Zashnain Zainal ...

Merge Into One: Photos from the Thai Floods of 2011

Merge Into One: Photos from the Thai Floods of 2011

In August 2011 the floods appeared aggressive, somewhat north of Thailand. Then it, like a raging beast, surge forth, southward – a destructive force of nature, that claimed land, farms, villages, towns and cit ...

Traditional Home of the Nias

Traditional Home of the Nias

The house of an indigenous chieftain from the Nias tribe. ~ Photograph by Zainal Lembang | 1976, Pulau Nias, North Sumatra. In the Nias language, the Nias people are known as Ono Niha; which literally means ‘de ...

Regret Nothing

Regret Nothing

In Times of Protest by Zashnain Bangkok – May 24, 2014   ...

We Remember Moments

We Remember Moments

I remember a time when society reacted with shock and anger. The Thai coup of 2014 had provoked public resistance to the military takeover. Pro-democracy demonstrators peacefully gathered on May 24, 2014 at Victory M ...

Culture Conflicts And Advancement

Culture Conflicts And Advancement

You are not what you say you are, you are not what you think you are, and you are not what your father is, you are what you are, and you may be surprised when you figure out what that is. ...

Goodbye Indonesia: The West Papuan Struggle for Independence.
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Goodbye Indonesia: The West Papuan Struggle for Independence.

Because it is virtually impossible for foreign journalists to obtain official permission to visit the territory filmmaker Dom Rotheroe and fixer Sally Collister travelled in the guise of tourists. Filming discreetly, ...

Information Instead of Arrows – Next Generation Activism in Papua

Information Instead of Arrows – Next Generation Activism in Papua

For decades, the struggle for West Papuan independence has been fought from the vast rainforests along the border between Indonesia and Papua New Guinea (PNG). But there has been little progress, and now second gener ...

Rohingya – The Hidden Genocide
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Rohingya – The Hidden Genocide

This is a story of a people fleeing the land where they were born, of a people deprived of citizenship in their homeland. It is the story of the Rohingya of western Myanmar, whose very existence as a people is denied ...

West Papua Tribal Leader Tells World About Injustice in Homeland

West Papua Tribal Leader Tells World About Injustice in Homeland

Tribal Leader Benny Wenda is on a mission around the Caribbean to sensitize the region about the modern day colonialism in the country of West Papua, a province of Indonesia covering the western peninsula of the isla ...

Land of the Morning Star – West Papua documentary (full version)
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Land of the Morning Star – West Papua documentary (full version)

Made by Australian journalist Mark Worth, the film features rare archival film and eyewitness accounts. Worth spent much of his journalistic career reporting on the region before his sudden death in a hotel room in J ...

Dialogue and Spin: Genocide on Australia’s doorstep, the West Papuan Story

Dialogue and Spin: Genocide on Australia’s doorstep, the West Papuan Story

July of 1969 was a big month. Whilst the ‘civilized’ world was focused on the deployment of three men to the moon, Indonesia was finalizing steps to wrest control of the territory of West Papua from the ...

Khalil Muhammad on Confronting the Contradictions of America’s Past
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Khalil Muhammad on Confronting the Contradictions of America’s Past

Historian Khalil Gibran Muhammad dissected the contradictions between the American belief in equality and freedom and its actual treatment of its own citizens ...

West Papua- The Guernica of the 21st Century (sans outrage)

West Papua- The Guernica of the 21st Century (sans outrage)

Similar to the blockade of Republican controlled areas of Spain by the fascists during the Spanish Civil War, the Javanese are economically, politically and culturally blockading the West Papuans and for much the sam ...

Portia’s Lament: Western greed and the death of the indigenous cultures of West Papua

Portia’s Lament: Western greed and the death of the indigenous cultures of West Papua

The truth is that everyone benefits from the exploitation of West Papua’s natural resources except the West Papuan’s themselves! The devastation wrought by mining and other resource extraction industrie ...

Of Myths and Facts: Kashmir

Of Myths and Facts: Kashmir

Ultimately the truth of Kashmir will have to triumph; Kashmir will surely outlive this hate, divide and oppression. ...

Maire Leadbeater: Treason Trial Threatens Fundamental Rights

Maire Leadbeater: Treason Trial Threatens Fundamental Rights

Amnesty and Human Rights Watch say that Indonesia is defying its signed commitment to the International Conventions that protect the right to freedom of opinion and expression and the right to peaceful assembly. Inst ...

Freeport-McMoran Digs A Heap of Trouble in Indonesia

Freeport-McMoran Digs A Heap of Trouble in Indonesia

Mining giant Freeport-McMoRan dug up a heap of trouble in Indonesia’s most tenuous territory, and it won’t get better soon. Investors beware. Remote locations, labor unrest, violence—this is the ...

Am I not a man and a brother: A campaign for someone else’s rights

Am I not a man and a brother: A campaign for someone else’s rights

What developed from that faithful meeting held on May 22, 1787 was one of the most ambitious and brilliantly organised citizens’ campaigns of all times. A grassroot social movement, in many ways a viral ...

Rio Tinto: juggernaut of cultural fascism and participant in slow-motion genocide

Rio Tinto: juggernaut of cultural fascism and participant in slow-motion genocide

A rough translation of Rio Tinto from Spanish into English is Red River. Spain’s Rio Tinto is characterized by deep red water that is highly acidic (pH 1.7—2.5) and rich in heavy metals. Over 5000 years ...