September 2006

Bangkok, September 25, 2006 The September 19, 2006 (9/19) coup d’etat in Thailand is a great puzzle for many. It is difficult to understand this coup not so much in terms of why it has happened, but its popularity. There were reports of people giving flowers and cold drinks to soldiers on the streets. In Chiangmai, kids would not stop bothering their teachers until they were taken to see the coup tanks. In fact, according to one recent survey, 83% of Thais nationwide are in favor of this coup. Given the positive popular reception of this coup, one wonders if there is such a thing as a “good” or “peaceful” coup?In this article, I wish to first offer an explanation why so many, both common people and noted public intellectuals, are supporting this coup. Then the moral enigma when reasons for the coup could be accepted while the coup as...

True, the situation in Burundi is not without its risks and problems. But it has gone so well this summer in Burundi. As you’ll see below, Reuters, IRIN (the source of most Reuters stories), the UN and a few others do a fine job – but their stories are not picked up around the world. To put it crudely: Start a genocide – and you get attention. Start peace and development – and you get virtually none. As if peace and a better life for more than 7 million people wasn’t worthy to report…TFF is one of the few organisations that follow and support the peace process in Burundi – through 11 fine civil society organisations in the country. You can read much more here, at our Burundi Forum.Below please find are some of the recent stories out of Burundi. Umuco.comUmuco News AgencyThe leading Burundian portal for news and comments in French and...

By Håkan Wiberg and Jan ObergSeptember 22, 2006 The 192nd member has recently been admitted to the United Nations. Montenegro with its 600,000 inhabitants recently had a referendum, where 86.6 per cent of those enfranchised voted. Out of these, 55.5 per cent voted for independence, and 44.5 against. Another way of presenting the same data is that 48.1 per cent voted for, 38.5 against and 13.4 not at all. There are reasons to dig deeper into what happened. What is the internal and external background to this event? Does it increase or decrease the stability of the region? Could this decision cause trouble at some point in the future? Could it have an impact on the question of independence for Kosovo? Indeed, is the Montenegrin drive for independence mainly a result of external at the time, anti-Milosevic pressures by the West and, thus, an unintended result of short-sighted policies years...

A Serbian journalist and TFF Associate argues that only a genuine compromise over Kosovo’s future status can guarantee stability.A true, balanced, and negotiated compromise on Kosovo’s future status would swing the pendulum of Balkan stability towards the European path. A manipulated, one-sided, and imposed decision would, however, open a Pandora’s box of secessionist movements in the world and release the ghosts of a nationalist past in the Balkans.As we approach the beginning of talks on the future status of the Kosovo province, it becomes crucial to grasp the full complexity of the Kosovo status issue.There has been an attempt in the last year and a half to close down international debate before the status talks had even begun by suggesting that only independence is a viable solution for Kosovo.The truth is, the issue of Kosovo’s status is dependent on so many historical, legal, political, religious, economic, and demographic elements that...

LONDON – A young Danish cartoonist is one thing. But a supposedly learned Pope is another. Pope Benedict has not only shot himself in the foot he has, unwittingly no doubt, joined up as a full member of President George W. Bush’s crusade against “Islamic fascism”- at least that is how it is being perceived, not unreasonably, in many parts of the Islamic world. Benedict is obviously still possessed of a portion of the same naiveté he had as an fourteen old when he joined the Hitler Youth and later the military. Just as his speech at Auschwitz four months ago seemed to pass over the culpability of ordinary Germans in what happened then so with his speech at his old university on Friday did he too lightly deal with the hard facts of the 1400-year relationship between Islam and Christianity. His apology is to say the least disingenuous. He...

LONDON – The most successful socialist society on earth goes to the polls on Sunday. It is not the socialism of Lenin, and certainly not of Mao. Nor, at the other extreme, is it the New Labour type of Tony Blair. Yet it is the socialism that the dreamers, thinkers and writers from Voltaire to George Bernard Shaw to Galbraith always imagined – a successful mix of human endeavour with human compassion, where the doors of a classless education are open to everyone, where it is not too difficult to get ahead, where you can make money, but you have to share it – with those who are not having it so good today and with yourself at some future age when you might be ill, infirm, lonely and unemployed. On the other hand, if you don’t miss a step and you die comfortable you can leave every penny to your...

The 11 solutions (Part 2) Part 11. Discuss the basic reasons behind terrorism It’s very simple: try to look at the world from the perspective of the disadvantaged millions. Try to listen with a Muslim/Arab ear to Western, sometimes Christian-based, politicians – how would you feel if you were in the receiving end of such arrogance, history falsification, constant threats of bombings, accusations about being less civilized and educated? Wouldn’t you be a little angry? You might not become a terrorist yourself, but you certainly could see those who the West categorizes as “terrorists” as people who stand up for your pride and against the humiliation. 2. Listen to the terrorists’ words Bin Laden’s first message dealt with, among other things, the wars the U.S. has fought including the atomic bombs dropped ion Hiroshima and Nagasaki. While we must never accept or endorse the meanest of all violence – that...

By Jan Oberg, TFF directorLund, Sweden – September 11, 2006 The 11 solutions (Part 2) 1. Discuss the basic reasons behind terrorism It’s very simple: try to look at the world from the perspective of the disadvantaged millions. Try to listen with a Muslim/Arab ear to Western, sometimes Christian-based, politicians how would you feel if you were in the receiving end of such arrogance, history falsification, constant threats of bombings, accusations about being less civilized and educated? Wouldn’t you be a little angry? You might not become a terrorist yourself, but you certainly could see those who the West categorizes as “terrorists” as people who stand up for your pride and against the humiliation. 2. Listen to the terrorists’ words Bin Laden’s first message dealt with, among other things, the wars the U.S. has fought including the atomic bombs dropped ion Hiroshima and Nagasaki. While we must never accept or...

Part 2 It happened five years ago and changed the world. But for the wrong reasons. The biggest problem is not 9/11 but 10/7: October 7 when the Bush administration started the “war on terror” in a mistaken or deliberate attempt to capitalize on that fateful day: 9/11. But their deficient and opportunistic interpretation of the event has created a world much more unstable than any time since 1945. Deficient? Opportunistic? If you think these are strong words, please look at the recent Discovery-TIME Magazine opinion poll. 49 per cent of the American people think that the Bush administration has used the threat of terrorism or the terrorism alerts for political reasons! (45 per cent do not think so). The same poll shows that only 23 per cent of the Americans think the U.S. will win the war on terrorism within the next ten years or so. And 54 per cent think that...

LONDON – Even if the U.S. Senate’s compromise with the Bush Administration over the Geneva Conventions and the use of torture works out in the way that Senator John McCain intends it will – and his previous efforts have always been given short shrift in practice – the damage has already been done. As Brita Sydhoff, the secretary-general of the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims told me in her office in a tranquil Copenhagen street last week, “We had always expected with the post Cold War spread of democracy and 141 countries signing the UN Convention Against Torture that torture would diminish sharply. It hasn’t. It is painful to see the world’s leading democracy practising it and now that we have lost momentum it will be very difficult to persuade other countries to forgo it”. Her council which has an enviable record in treating torture victims all over the...

Across Iraq, excluding Kurdistan, there were, in May 2006, 1,294 civilian deaths as a result of violence. The UN Assistance Mission reports that these people included 58 women and 17 children. Further, an additional 2,687 people were wounded, including 178 women and 41 children. ‘In June 2006, 1554 civilians died violently (among them 66 women and 30 children). An additional 3,075 people were wounded… The Medico Legal Institute (MLI) in Baghdad separately reported receiving 1,375 unidentified bodies in May, and 1,595 in June 2006. The total figure of civilians killed in Iraq adding the figures provided by the Ministry of Health and the MLI reaches 2,669 civilians in May and 3,149 in June 2006. According to the Ministry of Health, from January to June 2006 there were 6,826 civilians killed and 13,256 wounded. Including the figures of the MLI in Baghdad for the period, the total of civilians killed in...

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