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The Gray-necked Wood-Rail, although widespread from parts of Mexico through Central America to southern Brazil, is a rare find because it seldom ventures into the open. It feeds mostly on invertabrates. It lives along rivers and streams that run through or next to forested areas and in mangrove swamps. It will go up to about 4,000 feet above sea level and is found on both sides of the isthmus – more frequently on the Atlantic Side – and on some of Panama’s larger Pacific islands.
El Rascón-Montés Cuelligris, aunque está muy extendido desde partes de México a través de América Central hasta el sur de Brasil, es un hallazgo raro porque rara vez se aventura al aire libre. Se alimenta principalmente de invertabrados. Vive a lo largo de ríos y arroyos que corren a través o al lado de áreas boscosas y en manglares. Se elevará a unos 4.000 pies sobre el nivel del mar y se encuentra a ambos lados del istmo, con mayor frecuencia en el lado atlántico, y en algunas de las islas más grandes del Pacífico de Panamá.
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Nuestros uniformados se encuentran apostados en los tres anillos de seguridad, establecidos en el área interna y externa del Estadio Rommel Fernández, a horas del gran partido Panamá 🇵🇦 VS México🇲🇽 #TrabajandoPorPanamápic.twitter.com/ZrzKWcBrSM
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Mr. President: You should know, better than anyone, that the current situation in the country is extremely delicate. The crisis is comprehensive and deep. Its impact on the economy and health, despite having been devastating, continues to accentuate and the worst. It is the unprecedented deterioration of the government’s institutions, with an indiscriminate increase in violence, crime and collective insecurity. By virtue of which, among the citizenry, more than uncertainty, there is a deep concern for the future in the short and medium term, due to the absolute lack of serious initiatives aimed at putting a stop to corruption, impunity, waste of public resources and the disproportionate and irresponsible increase in indebtedness — among others of the many mistakes – of authorities who seem to act more as part of a joint criminal enterprise at the service of class interests.
Although there is no foreign war or internal disturbance, the existing state of general upheaval is widespread in society, economically devastating and uncontrollable. It’s an incontrovertible reality, a direct result of the application of extraordinary measures by exception, lacking legal support in the constitutional system, which constitute a serious threat to peace and social stability and which, in addition, could generate undesirable and unjustifiable consequences. That is why we urge you to assume the duty of a statesman, who with a vision of the future and commitment to future generations acts to safeguard the sovereignty and integrity of the nation. Today Panama is seriously threatened by the greed of a few, in collusion with stateless locals blinded by the desire for wealth, illicit and immoral in equal measure. Resort to the only source capable of conferring legitimacy on the exercise of public power, which today is unfortunately compromised. Convene, in short order, a constitutional referendum in which the people can express whether or not they want a National Constituent Assembly. We are confident that it would receive the majority support of the the citizens of this nation.
For our homeland’s comprehensive welfare, and for peace which is the fruit of justice… Citizens United for the Constituent Assembly (CUCO)
Leopoldo E. Santamaría 4-117-1954 Miguel Antonio Bernal 8-153-2773 Lorenzo Obarrio 3-711-1732 Laura Candanedo M. 4-69-469 Gastón Dormoi 8-196-1008 Anayansi Turner 8-228-956 …a list of other signers, which is growing
To fend off hackers, organized trolls and other online vandalism, our website comments feature is switched off. Instead, come to our Facebook page to join in the discussion.
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The Taliban announced on Sept. 7, 2021, that Mullah Hasan Akhund has been appointed interim prime minister of Afghanistan. The decision comes more than two weeks after the militant Islamist group seized control of much of the country, including the capital, Kabul. The Conversation asked Ali A. Olomi, a historian of the Middle East and Islam at Penn State University, to explain who Mullah Akhund is, and what his appointment may portend for Afghanistan amid concern over human rights in the war-ravaged nation.
Who is Mullah Hasan Akhund?
Mullah Akhund is a fascinating but relatively enigmatic figure in the Taliban. He has been an influential figure in Afghanistan since the inception of the militant group in the 1990s.
Instead, he is seen much more as a religious influence in the Taliban. He served on the Taliban’s shura councils, the traditional decision-making body made up of religious scholars and mullahs – an honorific given to those trained in Islamic theology.
Akhund is probably best known as one of the architects of the destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan, the giant cliff statues destroyed by the Taliban in 2001.
Initially, Omar had no intention of destroying the statues. But the Taliban founder was angered at seeing conservation money being made available for the UNESCO world heritage site while failing to secure humanitarian aid from the United Nations for Afghanistan. As such, Omar sought out the advice of his shura, and Akhund was part of the council that ordered the destruction of the sixth-century statues.
Akhund held a political role in the Taliban government of the 1990s, serving as foreign minister; however, his importance lies more in the development of the group’s religious identity. He, like Mullah Omar, was schooled in a brand of strict Islamist ideology, known as Deobandism.
After the Taliban was ousted from Afghanistan in 2001, Akhund remained an influential presence, operating mostly from exile in Pakistan. From there he would give spiritual and religious guidance to the Taliban throughout the 2000s and 2010s. In this role, he provided the ideological justification for the ongoing insurgency against the United States and the U.S.-backed Afghan government.
Today, there are broadly two factions in the Taliban – a military wing that carries out the day-to-day campaigns, and a conservative religious elite grounded in Deobandism that acts as its political wing. Mullah Akhund aligns very much with the religious faction of the Taliban.
What does his appointment tell us about the Taliban?
There appears to be a power struggle behind Akhund’s appointment. Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who served as deputy to Omar during the early years of the Taliban before assuming the position of de facto leader after Omar’s death, had been seen by many experts on Afghanistan as a potential head of state. But there is political tension between Baradar and the powerful Haqqani network – a family-based Islamist group that has become the Taliban’s de facto diplomatic arm in recent years and has been successful in gaining support for the group among other local groups.
The Haqqanis are among the most militant factions of the Taliban. And recent conciliatory language from Baradar on issues such as women’s rights, working with the international community and amnesty for members of the former government runs counter to the ideology of the Haqqani network.
Akhund seems to be a compromise candidate between supporters of Baradar and the Haqqani network. The delay in his appointment – the Taliban repeatedly put off making an announcement – could be an indicator of internal divisions in the Taliban. When the announcement came, it was accompanied by news that Baradar would be his deputy, while two members of the Haqqani network would also serve in the Afghan government.
Whether this arrangement is permanent or temporary remains to be seen, but the compromise could be a testing of the waters of the Taliban – to see how effective Akhund is as a unifying figure for the group.
What does Akhund’s appointment mean for Afghanistan?
Akhund is a conservative, religious scholar whose beliefs include restrictions on women and the denial of civil rights for ethic and religious minorities.
His edicts in the 1990s, adopted by the Taliban, included the banning of women’s education, enforcing gender segregation and the adoption of strict religious garb. This could all be an indicator of what is to come. Despite the conciliatory language of the Taliban of late, I believe it is likely that we might see a return to some of the rules in place when the Taliban previously held power, including a ban on women’s education.
We have already seen on Sept. 5 the Taliban order female university students to wear the abaya. The abaya is similar to a burka, but it differs in that the coverings are nearly always black. The abaya is not Afghan, but a style of dress more common in the Gulf states of Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
With this order, I see the Taliban signaling its intention to place Afghanistan within a wider Islamist movement. In the 1990s, the Taliban were very much an insular, nationalist group with the aim of bringing its brand of Islamist rule to Afghanistan. Now, Akhund seems to be looking to position the Taliban alongside international partners – an ambition that can also be seen in the Taliban’s recent diplomatic outreach with the governments of Qatar, the UAE and Pakistan.
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Arranca el Campamento Virtual
de Punta Culebra para Docentes
por STRI
Del 6 al 10 de septiembre de 2021, el Centro Natural Punta Culebra del Instituto Smithsonian impartirá el Seminario-Taller “Campamento Virtual Punta Culebra”, dirigido a docentes de planteles oficiales de Educación Básica General de toda la República de Panamá. Será el segundo año consecutivo en que se imparte de manera virtual un taller anual de desarrollo profesional para maestros y la primera vez que Smithsonian se une con el equipo de Estudio Nuboso, un colectivo de artistas, diseñadores, educadores e investigadores, para lograrlo.
El currículo, diseñado por Estudio Nuboso y con el aval del Ministerio de Educación de Panamá (MEDUCA) fue pensado tomando en cuenta los nuevos retos a los que se han enfrentado los docentes en los últimos tiempos.
“Hemos visto cómo las nuevas modalidades requieren de un espacio interdisciplinario de enriquecimiento, empatía, flexibilidad y creatividad de parte de los docentes en su labor hercúlea para servir a sus estudiantes durante la pandemia”, dijo Emily Zhukov, artista y educadora norteamericana radicada en Panamá, y una de las organizadoras y facilitadoras del seminario-taller. “Hemos visto cómo la colaboración nutritiva entre la ciencia y el arte genera nuevas vías para entender el mundo. El Diseño Universal para el Aprendizaje asegura equidad en el acceso a los conocimientos para todos los alumnos”, agregó Zhukov.
A lo largo de una semana, los educadores dispondrán un espacio de exploración para poner en práctica los modelos del Diseño Universal para el Aprendizaje (DUA) y del Aprendizaje por Indagación (Inquiry Based Learning, en inglés), en colaboración con artistas locales e investigadores del Instituto Smithsonian, removiendo barreras al aprendizaje mediante el arte y la ciencia. Estas nuevas estrategias y herramientas creativas les permitirán fortalecer el proceso de enseñanza y aprendizaje de la ciencia tanto presencial como virtualmente.
Los 40 docentes participantes fueron seleccionados con base en el orden de recepción de formularios y buscando garantizar una representación geográfica equitativa de todo el país. La capacitación cuenta con el apoyo de David y Patricia Jernigan y de la Embajada de Estados Unidos en Panamá.
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A rupture of pipes through which mine tailings flowed from the Minera Panama copper mine. It turned the water downstream gray. Lawyers and their experts might argue about how toxic the spill was, but for people who take their drinking water or eat the fish downstream it was a catastrophic blow to their way of life. Will the company “come clean” and agree to pay the affected families enough to move to a crime-ridden apartment block elsewhere in Colon province and get used to urban life? The neoliberal notion that there is a free market in which everything is monentarily quantifiable and financially negotiable is just wrong – morally and factually – yet that’s the starting point at which the mining company and the Cortizo administration are starting in their bid to revive a concession contract that the original concessionaire declared non-viable under Panama’s environmental laws and which the Supreme Court years later declared unconstitutional. Minera Panama photo.
Negotiating what?
The Supreme Court ruled that the original Petaquilla mining concession, from which the Minera Panama copper mine was later separated out, was unconstitutional.
So what does the government do?
It makes a “deal” with a Canadian-registered company, whose chief operating officer is a Panamanian from a prominent PRD family – a fact which Nito tried to conceal from us – to revive the failed gold mine, with pending applications to expand the gold mine and to establish a gold refinery that’s sure to raise the ire of countries and international organizations that are trying to stop the traffic in conflict minerals.
It starts negotiations with the separate and ongoing copper mining company, with the expressed main intention of Panama receiving more money than it has been. Protests erupted, so we were told that the first phase of the talks will be about environmental matters. The idea that any full measure of reclamation after the environmental damage is going to happen or actually can happen within the lifetime of any person now living is ridiculous. What “environmental talks” are likely to happen will be about to what extent the company and its successors will be able to violate this country’s existing conservation laws.
Some will say that Panama is in a deep economic hole and MUST continue and expand the illegal mining concession. We have chamber of commerce types urging that for “legal security” Panama must find a way to legalize an illegal contract, so as not to be sued by a multinational corporation. As if the corporation’s lawyers couldn’t have looked up the facts on the ground and the laws on the books and known the mess into which the company was buying.
The worst flaw of the whole renegotiation process is the government’s slavish mentality. A huge copper extraction contract being negotiated by a government that has no industrial policy? Nobody at or near the top of the government even thinks about adding value to minerals extracted from Panama, in this country, so that we make, use and export things made of copper instead of just exporting semi-refined copper ore? No manufacturing jobs here?
Extraction without value added is one of the hallmarks of underdevelopment. Even when someone gets a skim and buys fancy cars with part of it.
Panama is better off without that sort of an economic model.
Men praying at the famous Blue Mosque in Mazar-e-Sharif. There were – and are – historic Christian and Jewish communities in Afghanistan, but these are minorities in a Muslim land. Moreover, at the outset of the US intervention this area was the scene of a terrible war crime, in which many Taliban prisoners of war were tortured to death, so bitter local memories may inflame public passions. Will this iteration of Taliban rule take the Quranic injunction that Muslims should protect “People or the Scriptures” – Christians and Jews – as a serious part of the Sharia? We shall see. What the world does not need to see is a right-wing American fanatic setting the Christian minority against Afghan Islam. Photo by vetman.
No would-be Crusader should be allowed to start another Afghan War
Glenn Beck and a Christian organization created a stand-off with the Taliban, attempting to fly a few dozen US citizens, a few people who assisted US forces in its Afghanistan war effort, a number of Afghans who confess to the Christian faith to fly out of the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif?
Better for the US State Department to talk things out with the new government of Afghanistan, to try to let anyone who wants to go to leave peacfully. Better for the US Justice Department to pay Glenn Beck a visit, with our without an arrest warrant in hand, and let him know in no uncertain terms that he will not be allowed to interpose himself, or his religion, in a sensitive situation in which lives are on the line.
The US Constitution was not handed down by God and is not legally persuasive outside of the United States and its possessions. In any case, the use of Christian missionaries and those whom they convert as pawns in whose supposed defense imperial powers go to war with smaller countries is the stuff of 18th and 19th century European colonialism. The notion of the United States getting into holy wars like the Crusades or the Wars of the Reformation was specifically rejected by the founders of the United States of America.
Will Mr. Beck plead freedom of the press? US notions of that don’t apply under the Taliban’s brand of Sharia law. If Americans look honestly and deeply into US history, yellow journalism like the Pulitzer versus Hearst newspaper wars that provoked the Spanish-American War and The New York Times and The Washington Post publishing lies about Saddam Hussein’s supposed weapons of mass destruction have brought on great human suffering for no good reason. The United States was an active participant in the trial and execution of the publisher of the Nazi newspaper Der Sturmer, and raised no objection to the trial and punishment of Rwandan journalists who promoted an ethnic massacre. By any proper standard, freedom of the press does not include any right or privilege to incite pogroms, genocide or war. Such incitement is what Beck’s “save the Afghan Christians” ploy is all about. The whole world should stand against that, no matter what nasty things might be truthfully said about the Taliban.
Putting on ploys to provoke holy wars in hope that the United States would be involved are criminal acts. By their very nature, these things get people killed. If Glenn Beck gets himself haled before an Afghan qadi or the International Criminal Court, the US government should not object or intervene. It would be better for the United States to avoid such things by itself dealing with the Glenn Beck problem, so as to keep a fragile peace.
Mexican poet Octavio Paz. Photo by Rafael Doniz.
Deserve your dream.
Octavio Paz
Bear in mind…
He’s a writer for the ages — the ages of four to eight.
Dorothy Parker
Anything that contradicts experience and logic should be abandoned.
Tenzin Gyatso, the Dalai Lama
Inspiration usually comes during work, rather than before it.
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This Labor Day Weekend we honor our working class heroes: Richard Trumka, who led the AFL-CIO. Ed Asner, who led the Screen Actors Guild. Surely they are raising hell en El Otro Barrio. Trumka photo by Linh Do; Asner photo by Gage Skidmore.
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