Archive 1986 – 2017

Marianne With Bindslev, Poliiken.dk, 19 december 2003EU mister folkelig gejstStrid om blandt andet Irakkrigen har blotlagt EU som en institution med mange ord og lidt handling, og det smitter af på befolkningens tillid til unionen. Poul Husted, Politiken.dk, 19 december 2003Iraks nye hær i opløsningMenneskeretsgrupper kritiserer de irakiske dommere for ikke at have den fornødne baggrund. Anders Jerichow & Adam Hannestad, Politiken.dk, 19 december 2003Dansk plan for atabisk demokratiRegeringen gør op med årtiers tilbageholdenhed over for arabiske lande. Nu skal 100 millioner kroner fremme reformer, støtte en fri presse og sikre menneskerettigheder. Henrik Kaufholz & Thomas Lauritzen, Politiken.dk,19 december 2003EU-veteran: Et lykkeligt sammenbrud for EuropaBritisk EU-ekspert mener, at unionen står i en meget alvorlig krise. Vibeke Sperling, Politiken.dk, 19 december 2003Vinde på anklagebænken i HaagMilan Babic, leder af et blodigt forsøg på at løsrive Krajina fra Kroatien, har vidnet imod Milosevic, men onsdag indledte Haag-domstolen en sag imod ham. Marc...

Violence in Southern Thailand has hitherto claimed more than 3,000 lives of Buddhists and Muslims, ordinary people and government officials since early 2004. General Chavalit Yongchaiyuth, a former Deputy Prime Minister of Thailand, who was in charge of security affairs during the previous Thaksin government that governed Thailand in the early part of this decade, remarked on this violence that: “Our Muslim brothers (sisters) always greet one another with ‘peace be with you’, but at the same time killings have occurred among themselves which is evident of deviant (Islamic) teachings.” (1) In 2003, the PEW Research Center in Washington DC reported its attitude survey of Muslim respondents in Turkey, Pakistan, Morocco and Jordan about suicide bombings. It was found that 74 and 86 per cent of respondents in Morocco and Jordan supported the use of suicide bombings by Palestinians against Israelis. (2) But does this mean that most Muslims would...

Jean BricmontHumanitär imperialismÖversättning Margareta NorlinKarneval Formuleringarna är hämtade ur ett tal som Mohamed Mahathir, Malaysias premiärminister mellan 1981 och 2003, höll vid en konferens om mänskliga rättigheter 2005. Mahathir citeras i ”Humanitär imperialism”, en ny bok av Jean Bricmont om hur mänskliga rättigheter gång på gång har åberopats för att sälja krig, till och med förebyggande krig. Bricmont är professor i teoretisk fysik i Belgien men också ideologikritiker och har gett ut böcker tillsammans med bland andra Régis Debray. I ”Humanitär imperialism” diskuterar Bricmont framförallt USA:s senaste krig, mot Jugoslavien, Afghanistan och Irak och granskar de argument som lanserats för att framställa krigen som rättfärdiga, maktens legitimeringsmekanismer. Vi lever i de ohumanitära ”humanitära” krigens tid. Bombningarna av Kosovo och Jugoslavien 1999 kallades allmänt för en ”humanitär intervention”. Det var ett effektivt sätt att sälja ett krig där den europeiska socialdemokratin mer eller mindre okritiskt accepterade argumenteringen. De humanitära bomberna mot...

Om Martin Luther King, Jr. hade levt idag hade han firat sin 78:e födelsedag. Om han hade sett rubriken för vår marsch: Fackeltåg för ett kärleksfullt samhälle” tror jag att han hade lett stort och velat stå längst fram i tåget. Han talade nämligen ofta om byggandet av The beloved community. Det kärleksfulla samhället är nog den närmaste översättningen till svenska. När han tog emot Nobels fredspris 1964 sa han: ”En världsvid gemenskap som lyfter medborgerlig omsorg bortom stam, ras, klass och nation är i verkligheten ett rop på en allomfattande och villkorslös kärlek för alla människor.” Jag har funderat på det här med kärlek. Trots att vi ofta pratar om kärleken och alla har en bild av den, är det svårt att sätta fingret på vad kärlek egentligen innebär. Jag har en bild av kärlek som jag skulle vilja dela med er. Det är kärlek i form av en lök....

6. oktober 2008 Av och om den norske jurist Fredrik Heffermehlog hans sensationelle bog About Fredrik Heffermehl’s sensational analysis ofthe misuse of the most prestigeous peace prize ever Lige inden dette års fredspris offentliggøres publicerer den norske jurist, Fredrik Heffermehl, en sensationel analyse af forholdet mellem Nobels testamente og de valg den norske Nobelkommité faktik har gjort. Der er ringe sammenhæng, mener han, og påpeger at fredens forkæmpere for længe siden er blevet berøvet den mest prestigefyldte pris på området. The intention behind Nobel´s Peace Prize has sunk into oblivion, the Norwegian parliamentarians he entrusted with the award of the prize have taken it over and made it their peace prize. Since the end of WWII in 1946 well over half of the peace prizes have failed to respect elementary principles on the interpretation of wills. This is asserted by Fredrik S. Heffermehl, a Norwegian lawyer, in a new book, Nobel´s...

Australia’s new Labor government hit the ground reviewing. A swag of initiatives – the historic apology to Aboriginal people, scrapping the previous government’s workplace laws, signing up to Kyoto – were implemented straight away, having been long in the gestation. The rest is still, to some extent, up for grabs. So we’re all now being given the chance to have our say. How should Australia spend its military budget, and for what purpose? How should we relate to the Association of South East Asian Nations? Key planks of foreign and defence policy are being opened up for public consultation, with hearings on the new Defence White Paper touring all the state capitals. It might betoken a touching faith in the value of dialogue: our ability, as Australians – as human beings – to exchange firmly founded opinions and, in the process, fashion for ourselves a shared sense of what is...

. Once president, after the army coup that ejected the democratically elected Nawaz Sharif, Musharraf cast aside his previous macho character that once had nearly led to nuclear war between Pakistan and India when he led the army to attack the district of Kargil on the border of the divided state of Kashmir. He dropped many of Pakistan’s conditions for making peace with India. Diplomats both in Pakistan and India thought that India would never get a better deal over Kashmir. But although Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India was in favour of the historic compromise he failed to convince his foreign ministry, his intelligence services, the military or much of the public. Going back in time much responsibility needs to heaped on the shoulders of the supposedly most pacific of all American presidents, Jimmy Carter. Carter allowed himself to be thrown off course by the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan....

July 2, 2009 Chaiwat Satha-Anand On June 4, Barack Hussein Obama, the American President, delivered an important speech at Cairo University. After laying the grounds for his speech which included his life experience with Muslim societies in three continents – Kenya in Africa, Indonesia in Asia and Chicago in North America, and the place of Muslims/ Islam in American history and society, he addressed 7 main issues of global significance: violent extremism, Israeli-Palestinian deadly conflict, nuclear weapon and Iran, democracy, freedom of religion, women’s rights, and economic development/opportunity. As expected, millions of people around the globe paid due attention to this historic speech.  It was reported that 200 million in India watched the speech live. An opinion poll indicated that more than 75% of respondents in Muslim countries viewed it positively while some Palestinian factions based in Syria viewed it as “an attempt to mislead people and create more illusions” to...

Today marks the third anniversary of the terrible bombings in Madrid that killed nearly 200 people and wounded hundreds more, an outrage that was committed by some fundamentalists acting in the name of Islam. This was followed by similar bombings when four terrorists blew themselves up in tube stations and buses in London and killed 52 innocent people, including my cousin’s daughter, and wounded over a hundred more people. This event, and of course the much greater tragedy on 9/11, are manifestations of a very ugly phenomenon that has developed among a small minority of radical Muslims who have a deep sense of grudge against those whom they hold responsible for the afflictions that have beset the Islamic world. Yet it would be as wrong to define their activities as the evidence of a clash of civilisations between Islam and the West, as it would have been wrong to describe...

Reflections on the increasing impossibility of funding peace research that refuses to be intellectual ‘embedding’ in power. Summary This analysis has come about for four reasons: The article gives examples of why free peace research – if not social research in general – is becoming increasingly impossible. It starts out with an exposé of the funds being available worldwide for peace and for the military – about 200 times more for the latter. The ratio of peace researchers to military researchers is probably 1:100+. It may both be true that (government-financed) peace research is booming and that scores of institutes have been closed down. Today’s funding situation in Denmark and Sweden for peace-oriented research is then described and comparative flashbacks made to the situation in the 1980s and 1990s. If you think of Scandinavia in general as liberal and generous in this field, it’s time for a reality check. Then,...

25. februar, 2007 Jørgen Johansen Arbeiderpartiets forsvarsminister Anne-Grete Strøm-Erichsen vil innføre kvinnelig verneplikt. Det er mangel på soldater og hun bruker argument om likestilling for å få støtte til prosjektet. Dette er enda et forslag om likestilling på menns prinsipper. Å la også menn få velge selv om de skal stille på sesjon eller ikke ville være å likestille menn med kvinner. Og det er selvsagt helt andre årsaker enn likestilling til kvinner nå skal brukes til kanonføde. En gang i tiden var arbeiderbevegelsen en ledende kraft i det internasjonale antimilitaristiske arbeidet. Med første mai paroler som ” Tenk om det ble krig – og ingen kom” og ”Ikke en mann, ikke et øre til militarismen” planla de generalstreik mot krigen. Internasjonal solidaritet og samhold skulle gjøre at når generaler og monarker kaller til krig så skulle ingen stille opp. Det brukne gevær ble symbolet for kampen. Men når den...

March 8, 2007 2007 Spring Semester On-Line CourseMarch 19 to June 19 With faculty drawn from amongst the leading scholars and practitioners in their fields internationally, TPU is the world’s first truly global, on-line Peace University designed for government and NGO practitioners, policy makers and students at any level working in the fields of peace, conflict transformation, development post-war reconstruction, rehabilitation and reconciliation, and global issues. Since 1996, TRANSCEND has offered more than 800 on-site training programs for over 12,000 participants around the world, using the TRANSCEND manual “Conflict Transformation by Peaceful Means,” published by the United Nations. Now, studying together with professionals and practitioners from around the world is possible through TRANSCEND Peace University’s on-line courses, offered in cooperation with many of the leading practitioners and scholars in the field. In the March 2007 Semester TPU will offer 19 courses in the area of peaceful conflict transformation, gender, peacebuilding,...