April 2009

LONDON – Of all the words said and written about torture in the current debate very few has bothered to look up the history of the birth in 1984 of the UN’s Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. Much of the groundwork was done by Amnesty International. Among countries who put their shoulder to the wheel, the Scandinavians and the Dutch worked harder than anyone else. But not far behind them was the U.S., whose president at that time was the grand conservative, Ronald Reagan, who had no trouble in persuading Congress to ratify the Treaty. His fellow conservative, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher of Britain, also whisked it through the House of Commons in quick time. ‘Those were the days’, you might say. No one in the public debate, to my knowledge, has looked up the words of the Treaty itself. They are stronger...

LONDON – My eighteen year old daughter asked me on Saturday where she can safely travel to when she finishes school in June and has three months holiday before going to university in September. “The Muslim countries or Japan”, I replied. She was quite taken aback. At school they talk about the USA, Australia, Thailand and South America. “No”, I said very empahtically, “I don’t want you to go there”, and then set about explaining to her and her mother why I felt so strongly. I pulled out the figures from the new 2009 UN World Development Report. After a lot of research into different types of measurement, the UN decided that the only accurate one was the homicide rate. If you try to compare rape, theft, break-ins etc. there is confusion – every country, apart from those in European Union, measure these in different ways. Some figures are accurate,...

20:e april, 2009 Gunnar Westberg Återigen har Kim Jong Il lyckats placera Nordkorea i fokus. ”Utvecklingen i Nordkorea är hotfull” enligt tidningsrubrikerna. Vad finns det att oroa sig över? Och hur har egentligen regimen brutit mot internationella avtal? Man oroar sig för att vi vet så litet om vad som försiggår. Vet man verkligen så litet? På flygplanet från Beijing till Pyongyang för fyra år sedan träffade vi – en delegation från IPPNW, läkarrörelsen mot kärnvapen – fyra amerikanska kärnvapenexperter. ”Javisst, vi reser regelbundet hit för att träffa våra nordkoreanska kolleger”, sade en av amerikanerna. I gruppen ingick enligt uppgift också den förre chefen för kärnvapenlaboratoriet i Los Alamos, Siegfried Hecker. Denne skrev i en artikel i Bulletin of the Atomic Scientist att han var tveksam om kollegerna från Yongbyon, det nordkoreanska nukleära laboratoriet, skulle lyckas tillverka en atombomb. Den teknologiska nivån var alltför låg. Man hade satsat på en...

20:e april, 2009 Once again Kim Jong Il, the dictator of North Korea, has succeeded in placing his country, and himself, in focus, “The developments in North Korea represents a serious threat”, state media headlines. How concerned should we actually be? And in what ways has the government of the DPRK, North Korea, broken international agreements and treaties? We say we know so little of what goes on in their nuclear program. But is that really so? On the plane from Beijing to Pyongyang four years ago we met – we, a delegation from IPPNW, the international movement for a world free from nuclear weapons – four well known US nuclear experts. “Yes, we go here regularly to meet our colleagues in North Korea” said one of the experts. The recently retired head of the Los Alamos Laboratories, Siegfried Hecker, wrote a paper in the Bulletin of the Atomic Sciences about...

By Jonathan PowerApril 15, 2009 LONDON – Last week Scotland Yard (alas, working without their chief sleuth, the late Sherlock Holmes and his deft touch) uncovered a major bomb plot. Those arrested were all Pakistanis. Londonstan? However, they chose to arrest the suspects, after months of carefully tracking their movements, not bomb them from 30,000 feet. Likewise, when four years ago bombers blew up the trains entering Madrid’s central station the Spanish police laboriously ran them down. This time they were mainly Algerians and Moroccans. Those arrested, later convicted and imprisoned, had no formal links with Al Qaeda. In fact their ties were non existent, a government-appointed commission later found. Doubtless, however, it was the example of Al Qaeda that prompted their dangeous views. The Spanish, on their manhunt, did not choose to bomb them, or even blast them out of their hideaways. It was careful police work, backed by...

Written before the April clashes After a dinner conversation in February 2010, with a colleague monitoring conflict in Nepal, the Czech Sinologist based in Hong Kong concurred with others that “the situation here is a big mess.”  Despite relative calm after the judgment day when the court verdict was delivered on February 26, many believe that the storm is brewing this week with the news about the impending red shirt’s determination to hold a large-scaled rally against the Abhisit government beginning on March 12, it would be another fateful moment testing the resilience of Thai society. Given the ways some media choose to report the protest and portray the protesters, I won’t be surprised if some diplomats would report back to their governments that the Thai government is quite nervous while contemplating the possibility of issuing a warning to their citizens against visiting Thailand at the moment. Some foreign companies...

April 8, 2009 David Krieger In a remarkable speech for any American leader, President Obama, speaking in Prague on April 5, 2009, provided new hope for a world free of nuclear weapons.  “I state clearly and with conviction,” he said, “America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.”  He told his audience that America, as the only country to have used nuclear weapons, “has a moral responsibility to act.”  For many years the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation has been calling for US leadership for a nuclear weapons-free world, based on the understanding that if the US does not lead, significant progress will not be possible.  For the past two presidencies this leadership has been largely lacking.  During the George W. Bush presidency, the US was the leading obstacle to nuclear disarmament.  Now, with President Obama, there is a dramatic shift and the goal of...

LONDON – A fifty percent reduction in the nuclear weapons’ arsenal of Russia and the U.S. was proposed by President Barack Obama this past weekend. President Dmitry Medvedev seems to be receptive. What neither have mentioned is that we have been here before – with presidents Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev. But the plan was undermined by a key advisor on the American side and short sightedness on the Soviet side. Although Russia and the U.S. keep their missiles on hair trigger alert, there is almost nobody in the higher reaches of policy making on either side who thinks they would ever be used. Indeed, this has been so for years. Doubts about reason for the vast number of nuclear weapons in America’s stockpile go back a long way. President Dwight Eisenhower, the former Second World War commander in chief, observed that, “military statements of nuclear weapons requirements were grossly...

Or, Reality Show for Real Politicians – Part I Within a few days, Europe is host to the G20 in London, NATO’s 60th Anniversary in Strasbourg-Kehl and the Alliance of Civilizations in Istanbul. What shall we make out of these frantic travels, meetings and meticulously edited press conference sound bites by world leaders? Here is the first of two dissident analyses. C5 – Five huge crises coming together The world is facing five hugely complex crises simultaneously: Economic (system breakdown).Environmental (global warming +).Cultural (intolerance, clash of religions, Western cultural dominance).Political (democratic deficits everywhere, lack of hope and political interest in media and among young).Security (drug-like, ever increasing military expenditures to satisfy the Military-Industrial-Media-Academic Complex, MIMAC yielding ever less human security). Five crises coming together = C 5. In this perspective, watching these leaders, Western ones in particular, deliver self-congratulatory speeches and answers to journalists on the outcomes of the G20 and the NATO...

Lund, Sweden Within a few days, Europe is host to the G20 in London, NATO’s 60th Anniversary in Strasbourg-Kehl and the Alliance of Civilizations in Istanbul. What shall we make out of these frantic travels,meetings and meticulously edited press conference sound bites by world leaders? Here is the firstof two dissident analyses. C5 – Five huge crises coming together The world is facing five hugely complex crises simultaneously: Economic (system breakdown).Environmental (global warming +).Cultural (intolerance, clash of religions, Western cultural dominance).Political (democratic deficits everywhere, lack of hope and political interest in media and amongyoung). Security (drug-like, ever increasing military expenditures to satisfy the Military-Industrial-Media-Academic Complex, MIMAC yielding ever less human security). Five crises coming together = C 5. In this perspective, watching these leaders, Western ones in particular, deliver self-congratulatoryspeeches and answers to journalists on the outcomes of the G20 and the NATO Summits is almostunbearable. Apart from the reflective,...