21st International Day of the Imprisoned Writer

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***FORWARDED MESSAGE

A Message from International PEN

At the time of writing US and British forces, supported by Australia and
others, are carrying out military action in Afghanistan in an attempt to
force the Afghan leadership to hand over the chief of the Al-Qaida terrorist
group, Osama bin-Laden. Thousands of relatives and friends continue to mourn
those killed in the terrible events in New York and Washington of 11
September. New York emergency services still work towards clearing the
rubble of the World Trade Centre and surrounding buildings. Cities all over
the Western world are under alert, fearing further terrorist attacks. In
Afghanistan itself, civilians live in fear of today¹s bombs and of what is
to come. Refugees are making their way to the borders as aid agencies
predict a humanitarian catastrophe as the winter months close in.

It is impossible not to hold these events in mind as the Writers in Prison
Committee looks back on the past twelve months and marks the 21st
International Day of the Imprisoned Writer in November 2001. Yet it is too
early to evaluate what the impact of the events leading on from the 11
September will be on the state of free expression world-wide.  While
attention is ­ quite rightly ­ focussed on this crisis, the fear is that
long-standing abuses against writers in many countries will be overshadowed
by recent events. There are also signs that some governments are using the
situation to justify new crackdowns against their own citizens.

International PEN was founded in 1921 in response to the horrors of the
first world war. As the noted American author, Arthur Miller wrote of PEN in
April this year,  ³the originators [of PEN] believed that what was required,
if mankind was not to destroy itself, was an organized reminder that
humanity's survival transcended any nation's political interest and that the
most convincing example if not proof of humanity's essential oneness was the
universality of the best literature. Š That it is still around after three
quarters of a century when it has no army, no navy or air force, no
political rewards or threats of punishment, is possibly a triumph of
illusion over reality, the illusion that hope is rational in this world.
Probably for most people nowadays the culture of the West is the culture of
entertainment, whose central notion is that we are all going to live
forever. But there are still a lot of writers getting shot at, being jailed
and tortured, people for whom the act of communication is very dangerous;
or, as with our prison population, the world's largest, a terrible
difficulty when so many incarcerated are basically illiterate. When
political people have finished with repression and violence PEN can indeed
be forgotten.²

International PEN has recorded since last years Day of the Imprisoned
writers attacks on over 717 writers and journalists in over 100 countries.
Of these 35 were murdered. In November 2001, PEN will be highlighting the
cases of six writers and journalists from Myanmar (Burma), Vietnam, Tunisia,
Ukraine and Cuba to illustrate the type of attacks that writers today face
for speaking out. 

Long-term imprisonment is a means of suppression less used today than it was
a decade ago. However, certain countries continue to use lengthy prison
terms as a means of quelling dissenting voices. This year PEN¹s focus is on
two publishers held in Myanmar since 1990, and who are among the longest
serving political prisoners on its records. Myo Myint Nyein and Sein Hlaing
were arrested for publishing a poem for which they have already served their
seven year terms. But they are not free, because, in 1995 they dared to
stage a protest against their terrible prison conditions and were given an
extra seven years.

Dissidence has long been a dangerous activity in Cuba and the past year has
been no exception. PEN has three detained journalists and a librarian on its
records, and this year is focussing on one of them, Bernardo Arévalo Padrón.
A director of an independent press agency, he is serving six years in prison
for ³insulting² government officials.

Vietnam was a country that seemed, if slowly, to be liberalising its
attitude towards writers who speak out. However, the situation for writer
Bui Ngoc Tan, currently living under heavy surveillance after publishing a
book about time he spent in prison, sets off alarms that there could be a
return to the high numbers of writers in prison of ten years ago.

While long-term detention  of writers and journalists is an old problem,
attacks on writers who publish on the Internet has grown alongside the
popularity of this new media. PEN has seen crackdowns on the internet in a
number of countries, including China, Cuba, Tunisia and the Ukraine.

Tunisia has some of the most draconian laws aimed specifically at curtailing
freedom of Internet expression, an issue about which Sihem ben-Sedrine, an
editor of an Internet web-site herself, has written a great deal. She is
currently awaiting trial for ³defamation² and spreading ³false news².

One of the more disturbing cases to emerge in the past year is that of
Georgy Gongadze, an Internet journalist from the Ukraine whose decapitated
corpse was found in early November 2000. Over a year later his murderers
remain free and his case has led to calls for the resignation of the
Ukrainian President who is accused of complicity. Gongadze¹s case is being
highlighted this year by PEN as an example of the extreme dangers that some
writers face when they speak out.

International PEN is the world association of writers with members in over
90 countries whose primary concern is the promotion of literature as a means
of understanding across borders. The Day of the Imprisoned Writer is a
campaign of International PEN to raise awareness of the dangers faced by
writers who practice their right to freedom expression, as enshrined in the
United Nations Declaration on Human Rights. In November 2001, PEN members
world-wide, including in Australia, will be highlighting the cases mentioned
above, with the ultimate goal of ending repression against free expression
wherever they may occur.

Australian PEN Centres is an umbrella organization comprising centres in
Australia North, Canberra, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney. For further
information, including how to join PEN, see our websites: www.pen.org.au for
Sydney PEN, www.plateaupress.com.au/pen/pac.htm for Australian PEN Centres,
and www.oneworld.org/internatpen for International PEN. You can email Sydney
PEN at ozpen at pen.org.au or write to us at PO Box 1384, Rozelle NSW 2039.

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