Blood Diamond

I thought that this show was fantastic. Diamonds found in the country of Sierra Leone used to fund the ongoing civil war. Simple story, but the aspect on civil war hit me pretty badly. There were scenes of rebels exterminating villages, killing everyone in sight and there was a commander who said something pretty ironic. The scene was set in the mining fields where he told one of the captives, who were forced to mine diamonds for them.

Commander : Long live the RUF (the rebel organisation)! We are going to help the people of Africa, we're giving freedom back to the people, over here, there's no such thing as master or slave.

Such an ironic statement, given that they're forcing their captives (male strong villages) to mine diamonds for them. And this other commander chop off arms of villages so that they cannot vote during the elections. Freedom.

What struck me hard was also the fact that children were being brainwashed to kill. At first they were scared, but after awhile, even children have become de-sensitised to the killing and actually enjoy it. Civil war is not really over is it?

Over at dear iraq, the civil war between the sunnis and shi'ites are ongoing everyday. Palestine is also threatening to have one with the Hamas and Fatah fighting each one. And the strange thing was when "supposed" government soldiers coming in, they also ended up killing so many people even innocents and some of them even have ulterior motives.

So it's all about killing, can anything really stop the civil war? Can these countries ever get out of poverty? Seeing all the people in the refugee camps really really shocked me. I guess sometimes, i'm so caught up with life and myself that i forget that so many people out there are suffering. Compared to singaporeans who are poor, i think the people in those countries are infinitely times worse off. And to think people still commit suicide in singapore out of supposed poverty.