Interview with Zoya of the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan.

[StarfarerBill]

"Barack Obama announced on Tuesday that the US would be sending 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. (No word on how many private contractors would be accompanying them.) He did not explicitly use the Afghan women as justification, but many politicians have, claiming that we cannot leave the women to their fate.

"Zoya is a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, and she joined us to talk about what would really be best for the women - and all the people - of Afghanistan. Zoya is a pseudonym and her face is obscured to protect her identity."

http://www.commondreams.org/video/2009/12/03-0

[Thickasabrick]

1. K&R Thank you so much. Everyone discussing Afghanistan should

watch this. It really cuts through all the crap!!

[niyad]

2. k and r

[slipslidingaway]

3. knr - posted in political videos as well. nt

[StarfarerBill]

4. I thought this was a very important interview and I wanted as many as possible to see it,

so yes, I posted it in PV, as well. :)

[slipslidingaway]

7. Me too, just thought someone might want to knr the threads in PV...

;)

[StarfarerBill]

8. A few seem to be, so that's an uncouraging sign.

Thanks. :)

[slipslidingaway]

9. A few, ...baby steps :) and you're welcome. nt

[StarfarerBill]

10. I've noticed at least one other DUer posting about the interview with Zoya.

You and anyone else who reads this is more than welcome to post the video again, link to it at commondreams.org or YouTube, or link to the existing video posts as long as that doesn't break the DU posting rules.

This is the only Afghan voice I've heard speaking out about the desperate situation in Afghanistan since Obama's announcement. I'm sure there are more, but until they're found and posted I hope many more here in DU, pro- and anti-escalation, will get a chance to hear someone who knows what's going on there better than any Westerner does.

[slipslidingaway]

12. Definitely worth the time ... kick nt

[cali]

5. He didn't explicitly or implicitly use the Afghan women as justification

and saying he didn't explicitly use that reason is suggesting he implied it. he didn't.

[StarfarerBill]

6. True, but that's something you'll have to take up with Laura Flanders and GritTV.

As the introduction notes, politicians have used the plight of Afghan women as one justification for continuation of the war and/or the escalation; further, pro-surge non-politicians have done the same.

I thought hearing from an Afghan woman who knows the situation there better than anyone here in the US might clarify it a bit.

[EFerrari]

11. Kick

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

13. K&R

[two-fold nature]

14. Zoya, a name apparently known around the world. Except here of course.

In October of 1941, still a high school student in Moscow, she volunteered for a partisan unit. At the village of Obukhovo near Naro-Fominsk, Kosmodemyanskaya and other partisans crossed the front line and entered territory, occupied by the Germans. She was arrested by the Nazis on a combat assignment near the village of Petrishchevo (Moscow Oblast) on November 27, 1941. Details of the assignment and the arrest were classified for sixty years due to the fact that there was a treachery in this case.

The criminal case number 16440 was declassified in 2002. The case was then reviewed by Russia's Chief Military Prosecutor Office, and it decided, that Vasily Klubkov, who betrayed Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, is not the subject for rehabilitation. According to the criminal case 16440, three Soviet combatants: Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Vasily Klubkov, and their commander Boris Krainov had to perform acts of sabotage on the Soviet territory occupied by the Nazis. They had the task of setting fire to houses in the village of Petrishchevo, where the Nazis were quartered. Krainov should operate in the central part of the village, Kosmodemyanskaya in the southern and Klubkov in the northern one. Krainov had carried out the task first and returned to the base. Zoya had performed her task too, as was evidenced by three tongues of flame in the southern part of Petrischevo, seen from the base. Only the northern part was not set to fire at all. According to Klubkov he was captured by two Nazi soldiers and brought into their staff. The Nazi officer threatened to kill him and Klubkov told names of Kosmodemyanskaya and Krainov, who had similar tasks to Klubkov's one. After this Kosmodemyanskaya was captured by the Nazis.

Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya was tortured and humiliated. In particular, she was undressed and beaten with rubber sticks for two or three hours by several Nazis. But Kosmodemyanskaya did not give away the names of her comrades or her real name (claiming that it was Tanya). She said: "Kill me, I'll tell you nothing" (Russian: "Убейте меня, я вам ничего не скажу"). <1> She was hanged on November 29, 1941. It was claimed that before her death Kosmodemyanskaya had made a speech with the closing words, "There are two hundred million of us, you can't hang us all!" Kosmodemyanskaya was the first woman to become Hero of the Soviet Union (February 16, 1942).

http://populistindependent.virtual.vps-host.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=91&sid=3a3dcb946866030d1fd3a7a31424fc63

[xiamiam]

15. this and the john foster lecture on the afghanistan pipeline should be required viewing

amazingly however, few appear to be interested...

here is a link to part 2 of the john foster lecture although i do recommend listening to all 9 parts..its really not very long and certainly worth every second of your time...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPEgk87AANc&feature=related

thank you for posting this...i also posted from the original video post...one well known poster here told me that if i expected the interview with zoya to have any impact on his decision re afghanistan then we had a major disconnect...go figure...guess he knows more than her while sitting at his computer in iowa..or wherever