Reply #10: some things [View All]

[iverglas]

just remind me of the incident some years ago in a city near me ...

Some members of the police in that city, that police service being known for its stupidity and brutality, were involved an altercation with a fellow walking a large -- huge, that is -- dog on the main street at bar-exiting hour. The police, like them or hate them, had their hands full in that situation at the best of times, doing perfectly legitimate police stuff. They instructed him more than once to leash his dog, he refused, they attempted to load him into a paddy wagon, the dog became aggressive, they shot it. I happened to be a neighbour of the young man and his dog, and he was scum of the first water. But people shouldn't shoot dogs, really, unless it's absolutely necessary, and I would have expected, knowing that police service, that it wasn't absolutely necessary. So if forced to take sides on that story, I would really have had to shoot myself.

Take sides as between the Chinese government and the Falun Gongers, say? No, ta. I really don't care what they do to each other ... although my sympathies do tend to lie with the Chinese government. And China vs. Tibetan resistance, ditto; don't get me started on that Dalai Lama piece of crap.


It's the Canadian angle I don't get -- this guy just became a citizen immediately after the manadatory 5 year? It's was political asylum, no?

OK -- so this guy gets a newly minted Canadian passport and almost immediately runs back to Uzbekistan to 'visit' people? He's either nuts or a spook?

If he is a genuine little freedom fighter guy, then more power to him and my sympathies ...

There really are "freedom fighters" in this position -- they really do leave their own countries because they are in personal danger, not because they want to, just because it is the only option if they want to live, and they're no good to anyone dead. With a secure base to return to, they may feel somewhat safer engaging in their fight at home -- and they may feel morally obliged to. The survivor guilt of people who save their own skins and leave others to carry on really can be a heavy load.

Sometimes people really do just want to see family -- dying parents can have a strong pull, for instance. And after five years' absence, the local authorities sometimes really aren't particularly interested in them, and they'll be okay as long as they keep their heads down while they're there.

The problem is that the country of new nationality is only a safe base if they're not actually in the country of old nationality, and by returning to the old country they really do give up the protection of the new one, as against the govt of the old one, for as long as they're there.

Whether he's a real freedom fighter or an anti-China operative for someone else, who knows? -- and of course whether his fight was a genuine, democraticly inspired struggle is a whole nother question. I think I'd be kind of suspicious of the family-visit claim in his case, though.