Statement on deletion attempts of Wikipedia article on SWEDHR

By Professor Emeritus, med dr Marcello Ferrada de Noli (Ph.D.), chairman, Professor Emeritus, med dr Andres Romelsjö (Ph.D.), vice-chairman, and Dr Lena Oske, MD, on behalf of the Board of Directors, Swedish Doctors for Human Rights (SWEDHR) Introduction SWEDHR is, per definition, committed to the defence and respect of Freedom of Speech, civil liberties, ideological […]

By Professor Emeritus, med dr Marcello Ferrada de Noli (Ph.D.), chairman, Professor Emeritus, med dr Andres Romelsjö (Ph.D.), vice-chairman, and Dr Lena Oske, MD, on behalf of the Board of Directors, Swedish Doctors for Human Rights (SWEDHR)

Introduction

SWEDHR is, per definition, committed to the defence and respect of Freedom of Speech, civil liberties, ideological pluralism, and human rights for All. As defenders of Freedom of Expression, our policy is not to interfere with critical reports in media or social media about our organization and/or its members, unless it would entail inaccurate publishing of essential facts about the organization or its members, or contain statements that commonly would be considered slanderous libellous.

After a SWEDHR report authored by Prof Ferrada de Noli was cited in the United Nations Security Council on April 12, 2017 and later in a discussion around OPCW, the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter (DN) published a front-page article about SWEDHR. The cited report contained opinions by Swedish doctors on two White Helmets videos uploaded simultaneously by a ‘rebel’ organization in Syria in 2015 and which were instrumental in the requesting  for a No-Fly Zone in Syria, an initiative also supported by the editorial of DN.  The DN stance on this has been previously criticized by SWEDHR, echoing assessments by top US military that considered a No-Fly Zone in Syria “would mean war between the US and Russia, Syria”.

The DN criticism of the SWEDHR report did not focus on refuting any of report’s fact-based conclusions about the White Helmets videos. It, instead, focused on the fact that those conclusions were echoed in Russian media publications. It resented that SWEDHR representatives were interviewed by Russian outlets. It was, as far as we know, the very first time in Sweden that a Swedish organization of academic professionals was criticized for making statements to media outside Sweden. This is a flagrant contravention of the Freedom of Speech principals that Sweden claims to prevail in the country. The DN front page opinions were echoed in the rest of Swedish mainstream media that are commonly hostile to the Syrian government stance [AftonbladetExpressenGöteborg PostenVKMetro, etc.].  The DN article reported incorrectly several points in the SWEDHR report, but we were denied the right to a rebuttal. In fact, our report in The Indicter has been reproduced not only in Russia (including private outlets), but also in several other media abroad or example in Brazil, Uruguay, Mexico, India, U.S., Iran, Syria, Saudi, and elsewhere. Further interview requests came from Danish, UK, Italian, or US outlets.

The SWEDHR report also attracted the attention of Human Rights Watch CEO, Kenneth Roth who arbitrarily compared SWEDHR with “government-organized NGOs”, and spread on twitter a piece containing inaccurate statements against Dr Leif Elinder, a known Swedish paediatrician and peace activist, also active member of SWEDHR and Amnesty International. Furthermore, Professor Emeritus Anders Romelsjö was “accused” of running a “leftist political blog”. In fact the site Jinge.se has ranked number two at the top list of 800 Swedish political blogs.

Following this political backlash against the SWEDHR report amongst media and organisations with vested interests, our organisation received a further attack in its Freedom of Speech through the pages of Wikipedia.  A two-year old Wikipedia article on SWEDHR (Swedish Professors and Doctors for Human Rights) was replaced with a text containing a radical distortion of what our organization is and stands for. Among other, with help of a distorted citing of the DN article (which being in Swedish it cannot be immediately verified by the readers), the new texts have tried misrepresenting SWEDHR as “a Russian propaganda site”. Other sources in the recent edits have included a publication (in Ukrainian) by Svoboda, which according to its Wikipedia article is “widely considered a fascist and/or anti-semitic party”, and one inaccurate article in Le Figaro (in French) that we had already rebutted here.

To summarise, the current Wikipedia article in SWEDHR uses solely hostile reports against our organization, while other media in Sweden which have criticized the DN article on SWEDHR, or even our fact-based published replies (in English) [By Ferrada de Noli, Romelsjö and Oske (representing the Board of Directors) here, and by Romelsjö (Swedish) here and here] are not referred to at all. No one in the publishing world, particularly encyclopaedia-wise, would ever consider such practice as ‘balanced’ or ‘objective’ editing.

I. Wikipedia article on SWEDHR

On the Lead section

The definition of SWEDHR in the new Wikipedia article’s lead says that we are “a Sweden-based organization that publishes opinion pieces on international affairs”. Period. What has been deleted is the commitment to human rights by this organization. The organization’s aims can be clearly found in our official site. We have seen that it is customary in Wikipedia articles about organizations, that the aims of those organizations  are mentioned in the lead.

Additions were made, this time accurately, that SWEDHR’s “views presented on its website often directly contradict those of Human Rights Watch and other mainstream organizations”. In fact, this was one reason why we started SWEDHR. It is possible that this is the reason why the same Wikipedia user had previously unsuccessfully requested the deletion of the SWEDHR Wikipedia page. Is it right that only “mainstream organizations” get a place in Wikipedia, that support the opinions (and not criticized) of mainstream media owners, editors, governments or corporate establishment behind such “mainstream”?

With regards to Human Rights Watch, we have also published analyses done by them presenting them in a positive light. One example here. Our Human Rights advocacy was further recognised by other HR organisations like for example Médecins Sans Frontières, who send us a message of gratitude for our human-rights work.

Further discrepancies in the lead include the ‘editor’ mentioning The Indicter, but omitting the official publication SWEDHR Research & Reports. Lead section also omits The Indicter Channel, that in six months has reached 374,868 views.

On “Organization” section

The same user writes in the main section featuring the SWEDHR organization, that “not all of its members are medical doctors”. This is based on the fact that one very distinguished Swedish professor, an international award-winner in malaria research, and one the founders of SWEDHR, “instead” of being a Swedish medicine doctor is a Swedish philosophy doctor in a medical-related research discipline. Would it not be more accurate to say, exactly as it is stated in swedhr.org/about-us/: “SWEDHR is a non-profit, non-governmental organization formed with the participation of Swedish professors, PhDs, medical doctors and university researchers in the medical sciences and health-related disciplines, devoted to international issues in the human rights front.”

The claim in the article that “none of them is associated with any mainstream human rights organization” is not only a irrelevant, but, again, also a falsehood. Several members of SWEDHR are also members of organizations like Amnesty International or support Médecins Sans Frontières, and other such organizations.

Finally, as given in our official site and all SWEDHR documents and communications with Swedish institutions, the correct academic title/denomination for the founder of the organization is Professor emeritus Marcello Ferrada de Noli, who is a Swedish professor emeritus, not Chilean professor emeritus. In the context of a Swedish human rights organization, based in Sweden, formed by Swedish doctors, what would be the interest of the user in deleting the professor title and instead stating the founder’s ethnic origin or place of birth outside Sweden?

On section “Positions taken by SWEDHR”

This section fabricates our position regarding the 2015 White Helmets videos, that we have analysed (see our disclaimer down below in this section). The same Wikipedia editor picks and chooses among our positions, human-rights campaigns, to suit the agenda of this Wikipedia article he re-creates to discredit us. The result being that only a few, non-representative of the main positions and activities we have been maintaining, are listed. This is done totally arbitrarily by the editor and without any regard to what our positions and activities really consist of.

Significantly, our main human-rights concern about the Assange case in Sweden is not mentioned at all.  Most of our analyses have consisted in clarifications for the public outside Sweden about domestic (Swedish) political whereabouts or geopolitical stances relevant in the ‘case’, which otherwise would not have been known, also because of the language issue.

Neither is mentioned our denunciation of the killing of civilians in aerial bombardments and drone attacks in Yemen, Afghanistan, etc.  Also, a main concern of SWEDHR has been the denouncing the use of Torture on political prisoners. Not even this subject is mentioned in the arbitrary listings by that Wikipedia editor. Equally significant, our denunciation of all human-rights related wrongdoings by Swedish institutions or governments are also not mentioned.

Here is a sample of the real main “Positions taken by SWEDHR”, published in The Indicter and SWEDHR Research and Reports:

Swedish Section of Amnesty International voted to reject human-right actions on cases Assange, Snowden and tortured Palestinian children

Research report: Solitary Confinement Is Torture

Prison system in the U.S. infringes principle of Human Rights For All

Sweden’s six years arbitrary detention of Julian Assange

How involved is Sweden in helping U.S. military drone-killings?

How Sweden bribed its way to a seat in the UN Security Council using millions taken from the public budget for aid to poor countries

Analysis: The Assange case in the context of Sweden’s feminist foreign policy for international trade gains

How Sweden will help bombing Yemen exporting weapons to UAE

According to the UN International Covenant on Civil & Political Rights, Assange’s detention should be ended

Iraq war: ‘Neutral Sweden’s participation in US bombing of Baghdad civilian shelters

Sweden’s unethical – and unlawful ­­– arms deals with ISIS-backing Saudis

Tell Sweden to respect decision by the United Nations body on Arbitrary Detention and free Julian Assange!

Arbitrary detention of Julian Assange: Coalition of international HR & jurist orgs. submit document to UN for United Kingdom’s Universal Periodic Review 2017

Statement by Swedish Doctors for Human Rights on Sweden’s rejection of UN ruling ref. arbitrary detention of Mr Julian Assange

The same section “Positions taken by SWEDHR” ends with this disingenuous edit by the same user:

“Regarding the Syria conflict, articles in The Indicter, which claimed to analyse videos jointly released by the White Helmets and an al-Nusra linked local group, have argued dead children from an alleged government chlorine gas attack in 2015 were likely killed by a poison other than chlorine”.

But the above has never been a conclusion taken by the SWEDHR doctors in their video analyses. Neither is the conclusion by the author of The Indicter article. For example, the expression “poison” or “poison other than chlorine” was never mentioned in the article linked by that user. It is a deceiving statement.

Section, “Accusations of pro-Russian propaganda”

Beginning this section, the Wikipedia editor says, “As of April 2017, the organization is unknown to Amnesty International, the Swedish Medical Association, the Swedish Society of Medicine, and the Swedish affiliate of Human Rights Watch”. This is untruthful [see here below]. Anyhow, what that has to do with “Accusations of pro-Russian propaganda.

About Amnesty International, that is a double lie.  Firstly, the source indicated by ‘gamesmasterg9’, meaning the DN article of April 22, 2107, does not mention Amnesty International at all. Secondly, we have had a highly publicized interchange of opinions  with Amnesty International around our denunciation of “Former paid agent of Swedish Security Police dictated Amnesty International (Sweden) stance against Assange“. The Scottish TV channel Kilt asked Amnesty Sweden for its opinion about the exposures published in The Indicter by the SWEDHR chairman, and Amnesty did reply with a comment. This information is given by the journalist which received the comment from Amnesty, and it  is on video.

Regarding the statement about the Swedish medical associations, the fact is that this Wikipedia ‘editor’ misquotes DN.  DN says that when they asked ONE person from each organization (from the Ethical committee, and respectively from the section of global health) they answered that they have not heard of us, as SWEDHR. The truth is that the journal of the named medical organization (Läkartidning, a journal read by all the doctors members of that association, meaning almost all Swedish medical doctors) has previously referred to SWEDHR as ORGANIZATION, not to mention dozens of articles published in Läkartidning by us separately. Furthermore, the ‘editor’ omits to refer the reply we gave to DN –and which DN published in the same article– about those colleagues’ expressions.

Now, as far as the “Accusations of pro-Russian propaganda“, there is no evidence, proof, sourcing, which that Wikipedia editor puts forward to back their accusations. The citing done by the Wikipedia editor of the DN article is a spurious citing. This is the passage (translated) corresponding to a question raised in the DN interview with Professor emeritus Marcello Ferrada de Noli:

The questions you raise coincide with the Russian government’s line [“Frågorna som ni driver överensstämmer med den ryska regeringens linje…”]

– No, now I interrupt you. We have a line of our own, we engage for peace. Whether our findings coincide or not with a variety of governments, that is not our intention. It’s the same situation when Hans Blix made statements about that “Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction” they did not exist.

[“Nej, nu avbryter jag dig. Vi har vår egen linje, vi agerar för fred. Huruvida våra fynd överensstämmer eller ej med olika regeringar är det inte vår avsikt. Samma sak när Hans Blix uttalade sig om att ”Saddams massförstörelsevapen” inte funnits”].

DN eventually published this as the reply, which is fairly correct:

“–No, now I interrupt you. We only have our own line. Whether that coincide or not with the positions of different countries, that is not our intention.”

If any “accusatory statements” of that kind are done in a Wikipedia article, it should be accompanied with what the “accused” have commented on it. That practice is in line with the spirit of an encyclopaedia.

In conclusion, and judging of what is in the text in this section, the only one accusing of “ pro-Russian propaganda” here is the anonymous Wikipedia user, the same anonymous user all along.

The new Wikipedia article ends with this affirmation:

“Dr. Ferrada de Noli was interviewed by Russian media about his view that the Khan Shaykhun chemical attack of April 4, 2017 was probably caused by the opposition groups and not the Syrian government.”

We have never affirmed that.  To an interview question on why it would be possible that other forces than the Syrian government could be behind the attack, Professor Marcello Ferrada de Noli just said that in that case, the possibility would rest in that attacks of that kind have been previously documented from belligerent opposition forces, and that reports from the US have mentioned the possession of such weapons by belligerent opposition forces.

On the contrary, we have instead stressed that there is no solid evidence to conclusively put the blame on any of the parties involved, neither that the alleged attack took place under the characterizations described in the media. Therefore, we have only insisted in the need of a thorough examination by experts.

Neither we have ever said that the ‘White Helmets kill children’ or that its members have never done rescue activities. We have only said that a video examined by our doctors show improper, non-medical and dangerous life-saving procedures including an apparently faked injection. SWEDHR has neither stated which was “the real cause” of death nor the “possible cause” of death of those children. These issues were never explained in the DN article, and of course, neither here in this Wikipedia  article mainly based on recent edits clearly done to suit the agenda of the “one and same” Wikipedia user who did all the editing.

Comments about false argumentation used in edits and/or discussion

1. On the falsehood put forward by a Wikipedia user that I have never been one of the founders of the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR, Chile) :

Andrés Pascal Allende, nephew of the late President Salvador Allende, is the former General Secretary of MIR who led the organization after the dead in combat by Miguel Enríquez. He communicated to me via email on May 4, 2017, that he would prepare an official statement about me being one of the founders of MIR, and on my participation in the Foundation Congress of August 1965, in Santiago de Chile. Andrés Pascal is currently the President of the Miguel Enríquez Foundation, which keeps the archives on the history of the MIR.

I received the document signed by Andrés Pascal, ex General Secretary of MIR, on May 8, 2017:

The following books, including the specific subject “History of MIR”, academic theses in history, and media reports give testimony of my participation in the foundation congress of MIR, in August 1965:

a. Historian Matías Ortiz Figueroa, “El tercer congreso del MIR: giro generacional, re-estructuración orgánica y cambios en la militancia, 1967-1969“, Revista Tiempo Histórico, Universidad Academia de Humanismo Cristiano, N° 6, 2013.  (version pdf here).

Author Ortiz Figeroa refers in page 93: “(In MIR’s) young generation are noteworthy individuals such as Miguel Enríquez, Bautista Van Schouwen, Marcello Ferrada-Noli or Luciano Cruz, who enrolled the organizational structure at (MIR) foundation, and reached, by 1967, posts in the National Secretariat and the Central Committee”. 

b. Author Sergio Salinas, “Historia y Contexto del Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria“, RIL Editores, 2013, 361 pages, ISBN: 978-956-01-0040-5.

In page 219 the author refers one Ferrada-Noli’s stance in the Foundation Congress, in which Ferrada-Noli argued for inserting in the first paragraph in the approved “Declaración de Principios”, the libertarian aim of “abolition of the state” as ultimate goal of the Revolution. The book is illustrated in page 34 with a photo of Marcello Ferrada de Noli and Miguel Enríquez, taken in 1967, two years after the foundation of MIR. [Click on images to enlarge].

  

c. Author Juan Saavedra Gorritaeguy, “Te cuento otra vez esa historia tan bonita, Memorias de un Fundador del MIR“, Editorial Quimantú, 2011. Book presented at the Law Faculty, University of Concepción. Author Juan Saavedra is MIR’s lawyer.

In page 49 of the book, the author gives first-hand testimony that Marcello Ferrada de Noli, Miguel Enríquez, Bautista Van Schouwen and Sergio Perez travelled together from Concepción to attend the MIR Foundation Congress in Santigo, in August 1965.

d. P. Naranjo, M. Ahumada, M. Garcés, J. Pinto, “Miguel Enríquez y el proyecto revolucionario en Chile: discursos y documentos del Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria.” LOM ediciones, 2004. 352 pages. 

In Pedro Naranjo’s introduction text “Vida de Miguel Enríquez y el MIR” is clearly stated that I was both one of the founders of MIR and one of the co-authors of the first Tesis Político-Militar (Political-Military Thesis):

The above text in the book by Narajo et. al. has central importance in my complain, as the user who imputed misrepresentation in the foundation of MIR, declared the following in a Wikipedia forum on May 3, 2017, referring specifically to the book above:

“A google book search of this book shows that it does mention Ferrada – as a friend of Enríquez, and one of a large group of university classmates with whom he discussed Marxist ideas. I have no doubt that Ferrada and Enríquez were friends. This still doesn’t make him a founder of MIR.”

f. Authors Daniel Avendaño & Mauricio Palma, “El Rebelde de la Burguesía. La Historia de Miguel Enríquez“, Ediciones CESOC, 3a edición, 2002, ISBN: 956-211-095-8.

In page 62 of the book, the authors document that Marcello Ferrada Noli and Marco Antonio Enríquez (Miguel’s brother) collaborated with Miguel Enríquez in the preparation of the Insurrection Thesis, the main document presented in the Foundation Congress. The Insurrection Thesis, officially named “The Conquest of Power Via Insurrection”, is historically considered the first document of MIR.

  

In page 69 of the book, the authors declare that the source of the above information (the participation of Ferrada de Noli in the preparation of the Insurrection Thesis) was Marco Antonio Enríquez, in an interview that the authors had with him in Paris on February 2, 1999. (While Marco Antonio was history professor at the Université de Paris-Sorbonne).

The above notations on the book by Avendaño and Palma have central importance in my complain, as the user who imputed misrepresentation in the foundation of MIR, declared the following in a Wikipedia forum on May 3, 2017, referring specifically to the book above:

“The same as before. Ferrada is mentioned as one of many friends of Enríquez at university.”

The user was deceivingly omitting the passage he knew it refers to my active participation in the foundation of MIR. This user is supposed to know the book well, since the user has made a special edit in the SWEDHR page to include the  above book as secondary reference.

g. Nancy Guzmán Jasme, “Un grito desde el silencio: detención, asesinato y desaparición de Bautista van Schouwen y Patricio Munita”. LOM Ediciones, Santiago, 1998.

From the book by  journalist Nancy Guzman (referred here):

“In 1961 (Bautista Van Schouwen) enrolls the Medical School at the University of Concepción, where he met Jorge Gutiérrez Correa, Miguel Enríquez and Marcello Ferrada-Noli, with whom he initiated  his political militancy. In 1965, it took place the Foundation Congress of the Revolutionary Left Movement, MIR, in which they advocated for the armed struggle as a road to socialism”.

  

h. Author Marco Álvarez Vergara, “La Ruta Rebelde. Historia de la Izquierda Revolucionaria“, Editorial Escaparate, Santiago, 2014.

On page 68-69, the historian refers my participation in the Movimiento Socialista Revolucionario (MSR), the group from the University of Concepción  which evolved to the foundation of MIR. The MSR was composed by Miguel Enríquez, Marco Antonio Enríquez, Marcello Ferrada de Noli, Jorge Gutiérrez Correa and Bautista Van Schouwen Vasey.

i. Author Marco Álvarez Vergara, “La Constituyente Revolucionaria. Historia de la Fundación del MIR chileno“, LOM Ediciones, 2015. ISBN-10: 9560006177.

The author describes in page 68 the significance for further events in the MIR, of a discussion I had during the first day of the MIR foundation Congress with Trotskyists representatives, on the issue of revolutionary violence (I was a left-libertarian). Author Álvarez writes that “Ferrada-Noli’s attitude…opened the first discussion around the appraisal of revolutionary violence between the young sector and the Trotskyists. Eventually all Trotskyists left the MIR. Then we said, “without ballast we will advance faster”.

  

 

j. Journalist Gabriela Yáñez, “En exclusiva: La historia del baúl perdido de Miguel Enríquez“, The Clinic, October 5, 2014.

The report is based in the “Diary of Miguel Enríquez”, a series of manuscripts hand-written by Miguel Enríquez himself , and that it was discovered only in 2014.  In one section of the report is found the following text: “When (Miguel Enríquez) enrolls the high school Liceo Enrique Molina in Concepción, he met those who would become the central nucleon in the foundation of MIR in 1965: Bautista Van Schouwen, Luciano Cruz and Marcello Ferrada.”

2. The information given in a public Wikipedia forum that the Chilean media would have never covered my political whereabouts in MIR before and at the time of the Pinochet dictatorship is a complete falsehood. The following sample of photographs appeared in the main media of Chile, namely, the largest newspapers El Mercurio and La Tercera de la Hora in Santiago, and the main newspapers El Sur, Crónica and Diario La Patria in Concepción. To see these pictures open the documents below.

Furthermore, the Wikipedia-user who is author of the defamation, even argues that only Miguel Enríquez and Luciano Cruz seems to be named. However, the first newspaper clip here below, corresponds to a report in newspaper “Crónica”, Concepción, July 7, 1969. The dispatch, done from Santiago de Chile, affirms that a police force had traveled from Santiago to the southern city of Los Angeles, to perform an operation to capture MIR fugitives. It is said that the police operative took place “in a rural property owned by the parents of the MIR leader Marcelo Ferrada”. And the dispatch also adds that the police had reports that Marcello Ferrada, Patula Saavedra and Luciano Cruz, apparently, have been hidden there by the end of June that year.

Here is a report from main newspaper “El Mercurio”, published about two weeks before Pinochet’s military coup. The report is called “Trough The Terrorist History of The Revolutionary Left Movement”. In the text juxtaposed in the center of the image  (an enhanced segment of the column at the right, para starting “4 Agosto”) it reads,

“Near Concepción was detained the professor de filosofía and member of the Consejo Superior of the University of Concepción Marcelo Ferrada Noli. It’s about one of the 13 MIR-members, fugitive from Justice, and against whom there were detention warrants  in the process for subversion-activities of the MIR”. Other MIR members in the list: Miguel Enríquez, Bautista Van Schouwen, Luciano Cruz, Juan Saavedra Gorriateguy and Sergio Pérez.

Here below is the report “The prisoners at Quiriquina Island”, published by the second largest paper, “La Tercera de la Hora”, after that the Resistance to the military in Concepción took an end. The caption reads,

“The extremists that have attacked the military forces with fire arms, and also the local authorities,  have been concentrated In Quiriquina Island” (I am the “extremist” indicated with a red arrow).

To the above is to be added reports of May-June 1974 in the Italian newspapers e.g. Corriere della Sera, l’Unità, about my participation in the Russell Tribunal in Rome and/or my exhibitions of political art in Rome (Galleria Morelli, Feltrinelli Editore, twice).

3. The libellous accusation on that I would not be a truly political refugee in Sweden, is contained in the following defamation referred on my person, stated by a user  in the deletion discussion:

“An old man who fled to Sweden (where gaining political refugee status in the wake of the overthrow of Allende was extraordinarily easy – the sympathetic Swedes just took your world for it.”

The above libel is contested by life experience as multiple times detained, combating, and made prisoner by the military forces of Pinochet. The Swedish authorities decided to provide me with the Geneva Convention Alien Passport for political reasons, which was my only identity document until I received the Swedish citizenship [See also next item below, on Russell Tribunal]. Here in the image below, prisoner at the Quiriquina Island Camp.

PART I. That morning of September 11, 1973. A personal testimony

PART II. The Resistance aftermath. Prisoner at the Stadium 

PART III. My life as Pinochet’s prisoner in Quiriquina Island 

Part IV. Professor files VS. Pinochet, “Bring Pinochet to European Court of Justice”

4. The defamation on that I never would have participated at the Russell Tribunal in Rome, and that neither would I have participated in the Scientific Committee of the said Tribunal, is refuted by a letter signed by Ms Linda Bimbi of the Foundation Lelio Basso (Italy), who was appointed secretary of the referred Scientific Committee ad hoc to the Russell Tribunal on Chile. In this letter is clearly stated my participation in the above-referred Scientific Committee. Ms Linda Bimbi sent the letter to the Head of Amnesty International, Swedish section. Copies of this letter were given by Amnesty to the human rights lawyer Hand Göran Frank, who legally represented my case after petition of Amnesty International, and subsequently a copy of the document also ended by Swedish Immigration authority that decided my political asylum.

The libel cites as source a CIA document, which according to the user it would name only García Marquez and Gediger as members of the Tribunal. In fact the CIA document named by the user Gammemaster9 refers partly to the Organization Commission, and partly to the Jury of the Russel Tribunal in Rome on Chile. But the bio article clearly referred to the Scientific Committee, which was the one that continued working –after the open Tribunal ended the deliberations– with the documentation presented in the hearings. In my case, I entered the Tribunal Russel when it was already in session, and I entered as witness on war crimes in my capacity of “ex prisoner of war” [See certificate above].

A second source for confusion is that there was a “mother” Tribunal Russell, which had treated denounces of war crimes in a variety of world scenarios, such as Vietnam, etc. It might be that the CIA book is referring to that main organization, whereas I am referring to the Scientific Committee of the specific Russell Tribunal dealing with the human-rights infringements by the Chilean Military Junta. On the other hand I do remember, and vividly, that in the meetings in the offices of the foundation at Via Della Dongana Veccia, were both jurist Dedijer (at least in one meeting before a hastily return to then Yugoeslavia), and writer García Marquez (which stayed longer in Rome after the proceedings of the Tribunal).

If my name would not be found in CIA records reporting the whereabouts at that time of the Russell Tribunal (when Linda Bimbi was establishing the named Scientific Committee), it would also be for the simple reason that  at particular time I was undergoing imprisonment and torture for my participation in the Resistance against the fascist coup that the CIA helped to bring about with violent means.  After my testimony in Rome I was invited by Linda Bimbi to joint the Scientific Committee, because, even if I was an ex prisoner of Pinochet, I was also a professor (in Chile).

I was also a militant of MIR, and after my three month or so in the Scientific Committee I had to take other operative assignments in MIR, ending as head of MIR & JCR Sweden-based counterespionage unit in Scandinavia. I left MIR in 1977.

During a short lapse, user gamesmasterg9 tried to delete the Wikipedia article on SWEDHR (he failed), and then proposed deletion of and old Wikipedia article (“Marcello Ferrada de Noli”), the SWEDHR founder. He did this on the base of falsehoods. Furthermore, that same user has negatively banner-tagged a variety of other Wikipedia articles associated with the “Movement of the Revolutionary Left” where Ferrada de Noli is also mentioned, and (correctly) as one of its founder. Then, odd enough, the same user  asked for “speed-deletion” of one article called “Antonio de Noli Academic Society” –in which it is mentioned that Ferrada de Noli was, several years ago, elected “Honorary President”.

The above would show not only a behavior under agenda, but also constitutes a disruptive activity with regard to the Wikipedia readers. And not only the readers of the English Wikipedia: the same user gamesmasterg9 has then asked for the deletion of all the bio articles about the SWEDHR founder in other language versions of Wikipedia.

To summarise, out of the 50 most recent contributions which that user has done in Wikipedia between 04:49 May 10, and 04:30 April 17, 2017, whole 45 “contributions” consist of disruptive editing in articles in which the name “Marcello Ferrada de Noli” is associated with. 

Nevertheless, making SWEDHR, and all who is associated with SWEDHR, vanish from Wikipedia, will not extinguish our struggle for human rights for all, and the cause for peace.