Palau – Blue Sky

Running time: 13'

GER 2011, 13’

In 2009 the tiny Pacific state of Palau agreed to accept six Guantánamo detainees who in China belonged to the oppressed Muslim minority of the Uyghurs. Despite proof that they were innocent they had been unable to return to their home country after seven years’ imprisonment in Guantánamo. Johnson Toribiong, Palau’s president, talks so sympathetically of the problems and needs of the exiles that it’s difficult to believe a politician is speaking. We see images of daily life on the idyllic South Sea island, where the Uyghurs – without passports – are again to some extent prisoners.

 

Authors:

  • Christoph Faulhaber

    Christoph Faulhaber, born 1972, is a freelance artist and filmmaker. His performance “Mister Security” got his name on the USA’s Terror Watch List in 2005. In 2008 he was forced by the FBI to discontinue his residency with the New York art house Location One and leave the USA. His project “Guantánamo Auffanglager” in Hamburg’s HafenCity led in 2010 to Hamburg accepting one of the former Guantánamo internees.

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  • Daniel Matzke

    Daniel Matzke, born 1974 in Halle/Saale, studied Visual Communication under Wim Wenders at the University for Fine Arts (HFBK) in Hamburg. Central ideas in his work are Projection and Reflection. He works and lives as an artist, filmmaker, teacher, projectionist and live subtitler in Hamburg and Amsterdam.

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