I have been aware of for a long time that there is something debatable, to say it like that, with this tour to the French, ” says Arne-Wilhelm Theodorsen to the Newspaper.
Theodorsen is a pensioner and freelance writer. In a letters to the editor first published in northern lights, encourage him Tromsø’s mayor Kristin Røymo to cancel, Joshua, Frenchs lecture at Kulturhuset in Tromsø 26. February of next year.
Røymo is even critical of the lecture, but do not want to cancel. They do, however, 25 miles further south, on the Vinterfestuka in Narvik. Which created it, according to the newspaper Ahead a storm in the social media that the French should hold the lecture. Now he is taken by the poster.
We see that there are aspects of this reservation that is problematic, also in the light of the recently discontinued the nobel peace prize. Our intention was never to make Joshua French of a hero, but to hear his version of a much discussed and controversial case, type Vinterfestuka in a statement.
Tens of lectures
French has toured with the lecture “Sentenced to death” since October. According to the website to foredragsbyrået Athenas, lecture Frenchs “personal story about the background of the imprisonment and dødsstraffene in Congo, and eight years in the hope of a diplomatic solution.”
the Tour lasts until 6. march 2019. It is in all 34 lectures.
sold Out – at least six million in the billettpenger to French-tour
Theodorsen sat at home and watched the awarding of the Nobel peace prize, when the laureate Denis Mukweges words got the mind to move towards Frenchs lecture tour.
He said: “What can you do? Point a: You must not be indifferent. Point two: You don’t roll out the red carpet for the warlords”.
– “Action-commando”
– Joshua French draws a picture of himself as a kind of “action-commando” in the Congo. He is convicted there, and although you can ask lots of questions about the trial and the judicial system in Congo, so he is convicted, not acquitted. He was benåda and came to us, says Theodorsen.
He believes that there is no doubt that the French have been involved in illegal activities.
– Våpenimport, guns blazing, kommandotreningsleirer, and so on, ” he says.
Theodorsen charges also French to have had contact with the congolese warlords, and draws, among other things from the up tutsilederen Laurent Nkunda, often called the “Butcher of Kisangani”.
Nkunda is a former general in the armed forces of The democratic republic of the Congo, and is a trained psychologist. He speaks six languages and is a pastor in a pentecostal church.
He also founded the militia CNDP (the”national congress for people’s defence”), and led the rebel group M23, which is involved in an armed conflict with the congolese government.
Theodorsen thinks the French have had connections to the Nkundas business.
And no matter how you look at it, so there is at least one dead person again, either they killed him or not, who is involved as a result of their activity, ” he says.
Rejects the allegations
Frenchs lawyer, Hans Marius Graasvold, informing you that the French are not judged for the murder of the driver. Read the complete answer farther down in the case.
Theodorsen says he asked himself what can be done to shut down “the red carpet” Mukwege talking about.
I think that we do not just be let be to roll out the carpet for the warlords, but also for their lackeys. It is perhaps a strong word, but he is an enabler. To a limited extent perhaps, but still. They have not had something there to do, ” he says.
So think Aksel Hennie that Joshua French will react to “the Murders in the Congo”
senior Researcher Morten Brøås at the Norwegian foreign policy Institute set itself a more doubtful of the link between the French and Nkunda.
What we know with pretty high degree of certainty, is that Moland and French had a plan or a dream to get an assignment of Nkunda. How real this really was, it is an entirely different matter. The only thing we know for sure is that they at one time wrote a letter to Nkunda, where they expressed admiration for him, and a request if he needed their services, he says to Dagbladet.
the Letter was, according to the Brøås found on a PC, as the Ugandan intelligence seized in Kampala.
– But we don’t even know if the letter was sent. If it led to any actual collaboration, I don’t know. I must admit that I set myself a little incredulous to it.
– Ytringsfriheter win
In a SMS to iTromsø washers Kristin Røymo:
“Jushua Frenchs tour is both uncomfortable and ethically very problematic. Arne-Wilhelm Theodorsen’re absolutely right in all his criticisms on that he is given the red-carpet in it which has now become a justification and glorification of its history. Nevertheless, my principal attitude to freedom, including also freedom of expression, to win in the question about the use of the stage. I will not refuse the new year to implement the event. For me, it is, however, completely out of the question to even go on this show.”
Joshua French to thank for the support
– Freedom of speech is to protect the free thought, the free idea, and the free attitude. Freedom of speech is not to defend the criminal activity or glorifisere obviously illegal activities, says Theodorsen.
He criticizes Tromsø municipality to give the French a soapbox. He says they let the French use the microphone and stage to tell a story that he believes is based on a violation of the law.
– It stands in direct conflict with the wishes of the laureates. I linked this strongly to the Mukwebes speech, ” he says.
Theodorsen charges also Kulturhuset to use freedom of expression as a pretext to defend an event that creates “money at the checkout”.
I believe this has nothing to do with freedom of speech to make. It has to do with an event that glorify an illegal act abroad.
– Not politietat
Kultursjef Erik Smith-Meyer at Kulturhuset deny that the culture house earns significant amounts of money on the lecture.
Joshua French writing a book
– It is good that the lecture creates engagement and debate. Nothing is better than that, he says to Dagbladet.
It is about that he tells his version of his experience. He has sona eight years in the Congo, and he is, by definition, a free man in Norway today. What he chooses to do with its history, it is not up to the Kulturhuset in Tromsø to decide. If he will tell it, and people are interested in hearing about his person, and look him in the hvitøyet, as it is called, so is the fine.
– So you set yourself behind the argument about freedom of speech?
– Yes, we are not some politietat. We can’t go into to determine such things. He had been under investigation or prosecuted had it been something else, but it is not he.
– Misunderstandings and lack of knowledge
– As the French also have emphasized the former, he has not had armed missions for the insurgents or rebels in the DRC (The democratic republic of the Congo), writes lawyer Hans Marius Graasvold in an email to Dagbladet.
According to the Graasvold has French, together with the deceased Tjostolv Moland, worked as bodyguards for an informant who himself was not a rebel or a rebel. Before this work Moland and French as the guards on the fraktskip against pirates off the Somalia coast, ” he says. He further stresses that the CNDP were not in 2009, other than as a political party after the peace negotiations with the government.
It was taken over in January by a who later became regjeringsgeneral, Ntganda, as Moland and French have never had contact with. French has in other words never, either directly or indirectly, work for Nkunda, the CNDP or other rebels in the Congo, either in 2008 or 2009.
Graasvold said that Moland and French were in prison when the M23 was founded. He says the charges that are presented appear as small, specific, and seems like they are based on misunderstandings and lack of knowledge about what French has done and is convicted of.
– the Government is responsible of the Congo-the movie: So, is the murder
– French want to emphasize that he has deep respect for, and sympathize with, the good intentions expressed, and work for the people in the Congo, says Graasvold.
the French want, according to Graasvold at the same time to emphasize that it is the government of the Congo which bear the responsibility for the crime and atrocities in the country, together with militsene which is sponsored by Rwanda, Uganda and independent groups, ” he says.
– French servant, neither the one or the several million on his lecture tour. He was subjected to torture and this joke in Kisangani, and was later convicted of murdering his friend Tjostolv Moland, despite the fact that Anders unambiguously concluded with suicide.
French has been over eight years in the congolese military prison during the Graasvold call extremely inappropriate situations.
He is one of the most talked about individuals in the Norwegian media in the modern era, and now want to make use of their freedom of speech to tell his story.
the Full argument about the Congo-the movie: Threatens legal action over secret French and Moland-recording
