February 2002

To be human is to recognize the cultural perspectives that bind us to tribe, sect, religion, or nation, and to rise above them. It is to feel the pain of the dispossessed, the downtrodden, the refugee, the starving child, the slave, the victim. To be human is to break the ties of cultural conformity and group-think, and to use one’s own mind. It is to recognize good and evil, and to choose good. It is to consider with the heart. It is to act with conscience. To be human is to be courageous. It is to choose the path of compassion. It is to sacrifice for what is just. It is to break the silence. It is to be an unrelenting advocate of human decency and human dignity. To be human is to breathe with the rhythm of life, and to recognize our kinship with all forms of life. It...

Put together five things: 1. Modern technology, in this case aeroplanes, e-mail, phones and Internet 2. The recognition that every human being can be a peace movement 3. The idea of dialogue between civilisations and religions 4. Art in general and music in particular 5. Add a dose of creativity, or vision – and here is an example of what you get! Connecting Tokyo and Baghdad & the UN and music & Buddhism and Islam During TFF’s mission to Iraq last month, Christian Harleman and I met the Resident Representative of the United Nations Development Program, UNDP, Mr. Francis Dubois. We knew from an earlier visit that UNDP – like so many UN organisations in Iraq – do a fantastic job for (and with) Iraqi citizens. We knew that this mission like so many other UN missions around the world is the real UN, not New York. We quickly recognised that Francis...

At 86, Robert S. McNamara has written yet another book filled with wisdom and vision, Wilson’s Ghost, co-authored by James G. Blight. It is subtitled Reducing the risk of conflict, killing, and catastrophe in the 21st century. It’s a unique and moving reading experience. McNamara has almost forty years in public service; he served as Secretary of Defence to Presidents Kennedy and Johnson from 1961 to 1968. Robert S. McNamara & James G. Blight Through this work he offers personal lessons learned from both the Vietnam War and the Cuban Missile Crisis while he uses the framework of President Woodrow Wilson’s ideas to produce what I judge to be the most compelling realistic blueprint for a new American foreign and security policy. The personalities in the Bush administration would be wise to study McNamara’s morally and intellectually powerful and consistent exposé. I fear they won’t. Wilson’s Ghost is a book way beyond their frame...

At 86, Robert S. McNamara has written yet another book filled with wisdom and vision, Wilson’s Ghost, co-authored by James G. Blight. It is subtitled Reducing the risk of conflict, killing, and catastrophe in the 21st century. It’s a unique and moving reading experience. McNamara has almost forty years in public service; he served as Secretary of Defence to Presidents Kennedy and Johnson from 1961 to 1968. Robert S. McNamara & James G. Blight Through this work he offers personal lessons learned from both the Vietnam War and the Cuban Missile Crisis while he uses the framework of President Woodrow Wilson’s ideas to produce what I judge to be the most compelling realistic blueprint for a new American foreign and security policy. The personalities in the Bush administration would be wise to study McNamara’s morally and intellectually powerful and consistent exposé. I fear they won’t. Wilson’s Ghost is a book...

(forthcoming in the Second Edition of “Searching for Peace: The Road to TRANSCEND” by Johan Galtung, Carl G. Jacobsen and Kai Frithjof Brand-Jacobsen. London: Pluto Press, 2002) 1. Diagnosis. Politics, like communication is seen in terms of who does what to whom, how-when-where, and why. The what-how-when-where of the September 11 attack in New York and Washington is clear; the problems are who and why. But why is at least clear up to a certain point. Like the presidential palace in Santiago, Chile, also bombed on a September 11 (1973) somebody had something against what happened inside some buildings: the capitalism of the US world trade and the militarism of the US Pentagon for year 2001/1/; the politics of the Unidad Popular for year 1973. The text was written in building language, and like for all texts what is not written may be equally important: no museum, no cathedral, no parliament. The...

The undertaking of this chapter is to consider the record of the United Nations System since its inception, with an eye focused on prospects for renewal and reform at the present time. The main criteria relied upon for assessment are considerations of effectiveness and legitimacy in relation to the operations of the United Nations. The chapter begins with a discussion of why the present global setting is resistant to renewal and reform, but with the qualification that such a climate of resistance could change rapidly. And that over time, the sheer complexity of international life and the salience of global scale problems is likely to exert pressures to strengthen the United Nations. From matters of context, the chapter moves on to discuss the historical origins of the United Nations, and the extent to which the experiences with global security prior to 1945 shaped the character of the UN in relation...

For the project INSTEAD OF NUCLEAR WEAPONSBy the Swedish Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (SLMK) in cooperation with International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) Ten years after the so-called end of the Cold War, nuclear weapons are still with us. There is the BMD, the risk of diversion of fissile materials, the fear of nuclearisation of terrorism. The weapons and their means of delivery have become ever more sophisticated. Through base systems, sub-marines, aircraft carriers, the global reach of militarism has intensified. Still, in proportion to the increasing threat all this represents to humankind’s survival as well as to democracy and global development, public debate with visions of a nuclear-free is desperately feeble. Advocates of a nuclear-free world, face immensely powerful governments and military-industrial-scientific structures. We also face the arrogance of power of the roughly 600 individuals (presidents, prime ministers, defence ministers, chiefs of staffs and commanders)...

The unprecedented revocation on 7 November 2001 of Dr. Azmi Bishara’s immunity as a member of the Israeli Knesset opened the way for his criminal indictment on charges that he had violated the Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance (1948) and Regulation 5 of the Emergency Regulations (Exiting the Country) (1948). The essence of the allegations against Dr. Bishara was that he had on two occasions made speeches that expressed support for Palestinian resistance in Occupied Palestine and in support of the expulsion of Israeli forces from Southern Lebanon. Bishara was also accused of violating Regulation 5 as a result of his humanitarian role in arranging family visits by elderly Palestinians to their relatives living in Syrian refugee camps. Such a criminal proceeding raises extremely serious questions concerning the free speech rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel, and particularly those who have chosen to participate in Israeli governmental institutions. For the Knesset...

Det är rikligt dokumenterat att UCK-terroristerna i Makedonien, som har nära samarbete med UCK i Kosovo, har beväpnats och utbildats av Washington. Varför skulle då USA intervenera i Natos regi och bekämpa sin egen ställföreträdande armé? Närvaron av Nato- eller amerikansk-brittisk trupp skulle i stället främja Washingtons strategiska målsättningar. USA för nu återigen krig med ställföreträdare, använder sig av UCK för att strida mot Makedoniens armé, ARM. USA:s KFOR-styrkor i Kosovo är inte direkt inblandade, men amerikansk militär från det privata bolaget MPRI (Military Professional Resources, Inc, ett legoknektsföretag kontrakterat av USA:s försvarsdepartement Pentagon) är rådgivare till UCK och dess makedonska gren, som kallar sig Nationella befrielsearmén.1 Militär personal från den “civila” Kosovos Skyddskår (KPC), dvs UCK under FN:s beteckning, har nu anslutit sig till det makedonska UCK. KPC-reservister har inkallats och KPC:s stabschef Gezim Ostreni “som var avlönad av FN” har utsetts till ställföreträdande “befälhavare” i makedonska UCK. Ett...

Siden 11. september har en række regeringer, herunder også den danske, deltaget i en “krig mod terrorismen.” Det er sket på en sådan grad at man må frygte skadegørelse på det åbne demokratiske samfund og at vi kommer til at øge terrorismen. Jeg skal argumentere for at kampen mod terroren er en panikreaktion, der kan føre mere ondt med sig og at vi burde interesserer os meget mere for hvad terrorisme er og hvad der forårsager den. Terror kan definieres som organiseret politiskt vold, der bruges til at opnå politiske mål. Terror kendetegnes ved at den skader eller dræber uskyldige, sådanne som intet har med den konflikt at gøre i hvilken terroren anvendes. Mens terroristens mål kan være legitime, defineres terror ved at den hverken kan retfærdiggøres moralskt eller juridiskt. Da såvel mindre grupper af individer som stater udøver terror findes der to hovedtyper, nemlig smågruppeterror og statsterror. Fælles for...

Introduction By Jan Oberg This PressInfo is written by concerned American citizens. They express their thoughts upon reading PressInfo # 143, Bush’s “State of War Address”. Among them are activists, leadership experts, consultants, business people, professors, a priest, editors, while others who wrote are simply concerned citizens. They are about an equal number of men and women. Below you can read what they think and feel. All are critical of Bush’s policies. Did we select only Bush-critical messages? No. However, only one (1) among some forty responses was critical to the analysis in PressInfo # 143: a US government envoy to a conflict region wrote back without offering his name, “I would prefer that I do not receive crap news like this one.” These are the main themes: – Bush does not speak for me. I disagree with U.S. foreign policy. – I am ashamed that he is our President....

Ekstrabladets “Frontalt” Åbent brev til regeringen Som andre EU-lande iagttog Danmark tre minutters stilhed for de uskyldigt dræbte i terror-angrebet på World Trade Center og Pentagon den 11. september sidste år. Der blev også afholdt en mindegudstjeneste i København med repræsentaner for regering, kongehus og for De forenede Stater i Danmark. Ud fra et lignende humanistiskt hensyn mener jeg Danmark og ligesindede lande bør vise de uskyldigt dræbte i Afghanistan den samme ære. Af principielle grunde og fordi der er en indlysende sammanhæng mellem de to begivenheder. Alle religioner understreger at ethvert menneskeliv er helligt. Humanisme bygger blandt andet på den ufravigelige grundværdi at alle og ethvert menneskeliv er lige så værdifuldt som ethvert andet uanset nationalitet, race, hudfarve, køn osv. Der er således ingen tvivl om at et uskyldigt dræbt menneskeliv i Afghanistan har eksakt samme værdi som ethvert af de knapt 3000 uskyldige liv, der blev taget 11....