New Delhi, 14 Feb

Booker prize-winning author Arundhati Roy has announced that she will not attend the Berlin International Film Festival due to the “unconscionable statements” made by the members of the festival jury about “the genocide in Gaza”.

Roy was scheduled to attend the festival for the screening of her 1989 film ‘In Which Annie Gives ItThose Ones’ under the Classics section.

According to a statement published in The Wire on Friday, the “The God of Small Things” author said that “to hear the jury say that art should not be political is jaw-dropping”.

“This morning, like millions of people across the world, I heard the unconscionable statements made by members of the jury of the Berlin film festival when they were asked to comment about the genocide in Gaza.

“To hear them say that art should not be political is jaw-dropping. It is a way of shutting down a conversation about a crime against humanity even as it unfolds before us in real time – when artists, writers and film makers should be doing everything in their power to stop it,” Roy said in the statement.

This year’s jury is headed by German filmmaker Wim Wenders and includes American director-producer Reinaldo Marcus Green, Japanese filmmaker Hikari, Nepalese director Min Bahadur Bham, South Korean actor Bae Doona, Indian director-producer Shivendra Singh Dungarpur, and Polish filmmaker Ewa Puszczyńska.

At a press conference ahead of the festival’s formal opening on Thursday, jury president and German director Wim Wenders was asked about his views on “Germany’s support of the genocide in Gaza” and the selective treatment of human rights”, to which he said filmmakers “have to stay out of politics”.

“If we made movies that are dedicatedly political, we enter the field of politics. But we are the counterweight to politics. We are the opposite of politics. We have to do the work of people and not the work of politicians,” the “Perfect Days” director said.

Puszczyńska, who was the first to respond, said that the question was “a bit unfair.”

“Of course, we are trying to talk to people — every single viewer — to make them think, but we cannot be responsible for what their decision would be to support Israel or the decision to support Palestine,” she said.

“There are many other wars where genocide is committed, and we do not talk about that. So this is a verycomplicated question and I think it’s a bit unfair asking us what do you think, how we support, not support, talking to our governments or not.”

Roy, in her statement, criticised the “genocide of the Palestinian people by the State of Israel”, while calling the US and Germany “complicit in the crime”.

“Let me say this clearly: what has happened in Gaza, what continues to happen, is a genocide of the Palestinian people by the State of Israel. It is supported and funded by the governments of the United States and Germany, as well as several other countries in Europe, which makes them complicit in the crime,” Roy added.

“If the greatest film makers and artists of our time cannot stand up and say so, they should know that history will judge them. I am shocked and disgusted. With deep regret, I must say that I will not be attending the Berlinale,” the 64-year-old said.

She added that getting the film, a college satire written by Roy and directed by Pradeep Krishen, screened at the Berlinale had “something sweet and wonderful” about it for her.

Even though she had been “profoundly disturbed” by the German government’s position on Palestine, Roy said she received political solidarity from German audiences.

“Although I have been profoundly disturbed by the positions taken by the German government and various German cultural institutions on Palestine, I have always received political solidarity when I have spoken to German audiences about my views on the genocide in Gaza. This is what made it possible for me to think of attending the screening of Annie at the Berlinale,” she said.