February 2000

LONDON- The only question to be resolved, following the startling result of the Iranian parliamentary election, is how quickly the U.S. will now move to bury the hatchet. Its Cold War with Iran has gone on for over 20 years. This is unnecessarily prolonged, a prisoner of now distant memories of hostages taken in the U.S. embassy by hot-headed street fighters of the then recently successful revolution that had toppled the Shah and installed in his place the rigid, autocratic, Islamist regime of Ayotallah Khomeini. No observer brought up outside a theoistic regime can summon up much sympathy for the excesses of the Iranian revolution and its aftermath. Like the French Revolution, on which, in some part, it was modeled, once in power it immediately discarded any liberal tenets it held and became so rigid and uncompromising that normal idiosyncracies were regarded as a profound threat to the regime and were...

Ovo je pisana verzija predavanja koje je odrzao na TRANSCEND-u SGI-UK na zajednickom sastanku u Teplou Kortu (Taplow Court), Engleska, 18. decembra 1999. Za sobom ostavljamo vek koji ce pratiti uzasavajuca reputacija. Tokom njega je bilo puno manifestacije zapadnjackih (oksidentalnih) fundamentalistiËkih verovanja u takve istine koje opravdavaju ubistva, represiju, eksploataciju i otudjenje miliona cak i milijardi ljudi: kolonijalizam-imperijalizam kojem na celu stoji i ova zemlja; genocidni hitlerizam i staljinizam; slepe snage sveta, pre svih americki kapitalizam koji se danas predstavlja kao “globalizacija”; islamski (i on vrlo zapadnjaËki) kontra-fundamentalizam; nekoliko njima slicnih postupaka u Japanu i Kini. Dug je spisak ratova i nasilja a neke od njih danas predstavljamo cak i kao “humanitarizam.” No sav ovaj mrak probilo je i nekoliko blistavih zrakova. Dva genija, Frojd i Jung, uspeli su da prodru u kolektivnu i individualnu podsvest ljudi. Treci genije, Gandi, a pratili su ga u stopu jos M.L.King i Mendela,...

1. Democratic Control of a Military Alliance: Challenges and Problems The recent NATO military intervention in FR Yugoslavia (24 March – 11 June, 1999) underlined an urgent need for addressing some very significant theoretical and political issues the two most important ones being: 1) the issue of legal use of military force in international relations, or more precisely on legitimacy of humanitarian interventions; 2) the issue of democratic control of a military alliance in action. Obviously, the first question is relatively old, while the second one emerged as a rather new one. However, in the light of the Kosovo war they appeared to be deeply interrelated. The NATO intervention over Yugoslavia should not be considered as the main reason for theoretical deliberation of this relationship, but rather as an appropriate occasion for bringing the discussion up. From a theoretical and a political point of view, the relationship between NATO and...

 “On 10 February European Commission President Romano Prodi declared before a Latvian audience that “any attack or aggression against an EU member nation would be an attack or aggression against the whole EU, this is the highest guarantee.” This – sensational – statement of high policy has not been commented upon by any government, politician or media in the European Union. This may be interpreted as if Mr Prodi´s statement is agreed EU policy. If implemented as stated this statement marks a quantum shift of EU from an socio-economic union into a military defence alliance. Such a development might risk to promote the development of a renewed cold war in Europe, says TFF director Jan Öberg. Quotation – “European Commission President Romano Prodi surprised his Latvian audience Feb. 10 by declaring that “any attack or aggression against an EU [European Union] member nation would be an attack or aggression against...

LONDON – During the last U.S. presidential election campaign, the Republican candidate, Bob Dole, used to say in almost every speech he made, referring to the controversy over the use of American soldiers in UN operations: “I will be in charge of making that decision not Boooutros Booooutros Ghali” The school boy effort to ridicule the UN Secretary-General always raised a laugh and helped charge President Bill Clinton’s campaign to have the able Egyptian diplomat stand down. Xenophobia was regarded by both contestants as an electoral asset. Set against the campaign of four years ago, the tenor of the current one seems to be on another plane. The cheap shot at the UN is out. In its place, if not enthusiasm, there is at least a passive recognition of its value. It would, perhaps, be going too far to surmise the candidates realize that for all America’s almighty economic strength and...

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Är det inte otroligt att de nya utrikespolitiska moralister, som anser sig förespråka mänskliga rättigheter, demokrati och fred, och som spenderade obegränsade summor på krigföring, idag inte bryr sig om att frambringa det minimum av finansiella medel som krävs för återskapandet av fred i Kosovo? Detta är vad FN:s “UN Wire” rapporterade den 3 februari, 2000 &endash; bara ett år efter “freds”-processens började i Rambouillet. Detta vittnar, ännu en gång, om hur detta inter-cyniska samfund verkligen fungerar. “UNMIK har inga pengar, säger Kouchner. FN har inte råd att betala sina tjänstemän i Kosovo, meddelar FN administratören Bernard Kouchner idag. I ett samtal i “Japan Press Club” i Tokyo med journalister hävdar Kouchner att FN-missionen i Kosovo (UNMIK) står inför en total krissituation, punkt. Vi måste betala tjänstemännen.” Somliga av arbetarna har inte fått lön i flera månader, och “det finns 0.00 D-mark i budgeten för Kosovo år 2000”, fortsatte Kouchner....

We are leaving behind a century with a horrible reputation. There have been many manifestations of occidental fundamentalist faith in truths that justify killing, repressing, exploiting and alienating millions, even billions: the colonialism/imperialism spearheaded by this country; genocidal hitlerism and stalinism; the blind forces of world, particularly american capitalism now even presenting itself as “globalization”; the (also occidental) islamic, counter-fundamentalism; and some similar practices in Japan and China. There has been an increasing litany of war and violence, some of it today even presented as “humanitarianism”. There were shining lights. Two geniuses, Freud and Jung, penetrated the individual and collective human subconscious. A third genius, Gandhi, followed by King Jr and Mandela, explored the enormous potential of nonviolence. The first two, both Westerners, probed the roots of evil in the darkest recesses of the soul; the other three, none of them western whites, expanded the perimeters of the soulforce of...

With Steve Marks (now the François-Xavier Bagnoud Professor of Health and Human Rights at the Harvard School of Public Health) professor Burns Weston has recently published: “The Future of International Human Rights” (Ardsley, NY: Transnational Publishers, Inc., 1999). The book can be purchased directly from our publisher, Transnational Publishers, Inc., in Ardsley, New York either by phone (1-800-914-8186) or via their Web site (http://www.transnationalpubs.com) at the list price of $115. The book was conceived as a way to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the UDHR and seeks to envisage the future of international human rights through both an analysis of existing human rights norms, institutions, and procedures, and the projection of preferred future trends in these realms. It consists of 13 provocative essays plus a foreword by UNHCHR Mary Robinson and a poem by award-winning Iowa poet Marvin Bell (“The Dead Have Nothing to Lose by Telling the Truth”). The authors and...

LONDON- Couldn’t the contestants in the U.S. presidential primaries toss us in the rest of the world just one crumb? For example, in this foreign policy starved contest, a serious discussion about whether they are planning, if elected, to make a unilateral abrogation of one of most important international treaties in existence, the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. It was negotiated and signed on behalf of the U.S. and the Soviet Union by presidents Nixon and Brezhnev and described ever since by presidents on both sides as “the cornerstone of the strategic relationship”. One would perhaps think that the electors of the world’s single superpower might press the candidates on this point, not just because a good part of the rest of the world is hanging on an answer, but because it will profoundly affect their own country’s relationship not just with Russia but with China and Europe. Indeed, one could add...

“Isn’t it amazing that the new moralists who profess to protect human rights, democracy and peace and who spent unlimited funds on warfare now don’t even bother to provide the UN with the minimum funds to bring peace to Kosovo? The UN urgently needs US$ 102 million. That equals what Sweden spent on sending 860 soldiers to Kosovo. This is what the United Nations Foundation “UN Wire” reported on February 3, 2000 – about a year after the Rambouillet “peace” process began. It is yet another proof of the inter-cynical community’s mode of operation,” says Jan Oberg. – – – – – – “UNMIK Out Of Money, Kouchner Says The United Nations has no money to pay its civil servants in Kosovo, UN administrator Bernard Kouchner said today. Speaking to reporters at the Japan Press Club in Tokyo, Kouchner said the UN Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) is “facing an emergency,...