Archive 1986 – 2017

The recognition of the work of women and human rights activists in Islam The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Ms Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian judge, lawyer and political activist, was as inspired as it was unexpected. The granting of that prestigious prize to the first Muslim woman, especially from a country where women have had to put up with the medieval status forced on them by the mullahs, sends a number of powerful messages to a whole variety of different audiences. The first message of this award is clearly to Iranian reformers and political activists, especially those who work for equal rights for women. Short background The 1962 “Family Protection Law” passed by the Iranian parliament under the shah was one of the most enlightened documents on the rights of women in the entire Middle East and the Islamic world as a whole. That law granted women votes,...

 “The world has entered a new nuclear age, a second nuclear age. The danger is rising that nuclear weapons will be used against the United States. Just as bad, the danger is rising that the United States will use nuclear weapons against others.” With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the breakup of the Soviet Union, many Americans gave a deep sigh of relief and pronounced the nuclear threat at an end. It was a heady time. I can remember being asked, “What will the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation do now that the nuclear threat is gone?” My response was that the nuclear threat was still with us despite these momentous changes in the geopolitical landscape. It was far too soon to pronounce the Nuclear Age dead. In retrospect, from a vantage point of more than 12 years after these tectonic shifts in geopolitics, we can see that the...

VIENNA – Five years ago there was a headline in the International Herald Tribune, “Austria to Start Returning Artwork Looted by the Nazis”. The article beneath, reporting on a promise made by the Austrian government in a statement to parliament, came exactly 53 years and 7 months after the defeat of the Nazi Reich. But today, 58 years on, the change at best can be said to have been incremental. Much of Austria still buries its head in the sand, convinced to its bone that it was a “victim” of Hitler, not in fact a co-conspirator as the rest of the world knows it was, and most of the art and other looted artifacts and wealth remains unreturned. In 1999 the distinguished Austrian writer, Hubertus Czernin, whose previous work had exposed the unsavory war record of Kurt Waldheim, who had been both UN secretary general and president of Austria, and the...

Sätt klackarna i backen. Propagandaångvälten för minnet av den 11 september är tillbaka igen för att kväsa oppositionen mot USA:s krigs- och imperiepolitik. Här några punkter som hjälper dig att fortsatt hålla kursen stadig. Vi lägger fram dem i djup respekt för de oskyldiga som dog den 11 september och de lika oskyldiga som dog i anfallen mot Afghanistan och Irak under kriget mot terrorismen. Utnyttja dessa punkter – särskilt om du är lärare, journalist eller annars en medborgare som bryr dig. Lär och minns 11-07-20 Innan dessa punkter radas upp, är det några saker som bör nämnas. Under hundratales föredrag, tal och intervjuer har jag frågat åhörare i många länder om de vet vad den 11 september är för något. Naturligtvis gör de det och några kanske också nämner den av USA understödda omstörtningen av den folkvalda regeringen Salvador Allende i Chile 1973 för 30 år sedan. Som av...

Or learn the number 11-07-20 Dig in your heels, the September 11 memorial propaganda steamroller is back again – to quell opposition to US wars and imperial policies. The following points are meant to help you stay focussed. We raise them in deep respect for the innocent people who died on September 11 and the equally innocent who died in the attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq in the war on terrorism.Use these points – particularly if you are a teacher, journalist or an otherwise concerned citizen. Learn and remember 11-07-20 Before listing these points, a few things should be mentioned. During hundreds of lectures, speeches and interviews, I have asked audiences in many countries whether they know what September 11 is. Of course they do, and a few may add the US-backed overthrow of the popularly elected government of Salavador Allende in Chile in 1973, 30 years ago. Incidentally, more than 3,000...

The Iraq debacle is providing a historic opportunity to implement long sought, widely supported reforms needed for the UN – to assure its independence and its vital role in this new century. The breakdown in the Security Council over the US war on Iraq illustrated its obsolete aspects. An anachronism of the post-World War II era, its permanent five members: the USA, Britain, France, China and Russia with their veto power, finally demonstrated all its dysfunctional aspects. Most reformers agree on the indispensability of the Security Council – and the shape and direction of needed reforms. The Council needs to dispense finally with the veto – a relic nod to the winners of World War II. Then the permanent seats can be rearranged to accommodate important new world players, including India, Brasil, Japan, South Africa and newly democratic Indonesia with the world’s largest Muslim population. To keep the Council’s size...

På toårsdagen for terrorangrebet i USA, den 11. september 2003, bragte Japan Times en artikel af SGIs præsident Daisaku Ikeda. Japan Times er et stort og indflydelsesrigt, internationalt dagblad, og det vakte derfor opsigt og stor glæde blandt de japanske Soka Gakkai medlemmer at Ikeda Sensei kunne få sine meninger bragt ud til en stor offentlighed. The Japan Times: 11. september 2003Eksklusivt for Japan Times “På toppen af den pyramide som vi kalder civilisation, befinder krigens virkelighed sig stadig. Vi kan ikke kalde os fuldt civiliserede mennesker sålænge muligheden for krig eksisterer og oveni købet tages for givet.” Disse stærke ord stammer fra John Kenneth Galbraith som var vidne til det 20. århundredes krige og vold. Professor Galbraith og jeg har en dialog kørende hvori vi bl.a. åbenhjertigt udveksler synspunkter angående den 11. september 2001. Vi er alle direkte eller indirekte blevet påvirket af denne rædselsvækkende forbrydelse og dens eftervirkninger....

Japan Times11 September 2003 “At the top of the pyramid which we call civilization there is still the terrible fact of war. We cannot call ourselves a fully civilized people as long as that possibility exists and is, indeed, taken for granted.” These are the heartfelt words of John Kenneth Galbraith, a man who witnessed firsthand the war and violence of the 20th century. Professor Galbraith and I are engaged in an ongoing dialogue that has included a frank exchange of views on the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Directly or indirectly, we have all been affected by this horrific crime and its aftermath. One of the victims was a gifted graduate of Soka University whom I knew personally. However deep our sense of outrage, we must not allow the flames of hatred and anger to drive our world toward further division and destruction. It is crucial to maintain...

Den irakiske fiasko åbner for en historisk chanse for at gennemføre en længe savnet, bredt støttet reform, som FN behøver for at kunne sikre sin uafhængighed og sin vitale rolle i dette nye århundrede. Sammenbruddet i Sikkerhedsrådet på grund af USA’s krig mod Irak, giver et godt billede af de forældede rutiner. En overleveret arv fra efterkrigstiden (de fem stående medlemmer: USA, Stor Britanien, Frankrig, Kina og Rusland med hver deres vetoret) viser til syvende og sidst alle de ubrugelige aspekter i en nøddeskal. De fleste reformivrere er enige om Sikkerhedsrådets uundværlighed – og også om hvilken form og retning forbedringerne skal have. Rådet må definitivt gøre en ende på vetoretten – et relikie der i sin tid blev givet til vinderne af Den 2.Verdenskrig. Så der skal møbleres om på de permanente stole så der kan blive plads til vigtige nye medsiddere ved det globale bord, deriblandt Indien, Brasilien,...

Proliferation and Full Spectrum Dominance “The horror scenarios of the Cold War have disappeared, but the threat of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons has not.  Like the monstrous Hydra of Greek mythology, modern weapons of mass destruction are sprouting new heads faster than anybody can cut them off.” So wrote Anna Lindh and Erkki Tuomioja, the Foreign Ministers of Sweden and Finland respectively, in an article in The International Herald Tribune, whose title gives their answer to the threat:  “Slaying the Hydra – together”.  As they conclude: “Even Hercules could not kill the many headed monster alone.  Only by acting together will we safeguard the security of all.” In spite of strenuous combined efforts, the hydra of proliferation remains very much with us, and it has certainly not been caged by the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).  The most recent NPT preparatory conference, held in Geneva, between April 28th and May 9th 2003,...

ISTANBUL – So far Turkey has weathered the storm of the Iraq war. Its prow remains pointed towards Europe but its sails are still open to catch a helpful wind from America which, for all its present estrangement from Europe and its differences with Turkey over the war and its aftermath, has long been a fervent supporter of Turkish membership of the European Union. More than ever before, the Turks, in many ways historically an anchor of the oft turbulent Islamic world, want to be part of Europe. For an intellectual minority this has been a long cherished goal. Now it appears to be becoming a country-wide aspiration. If Turkey were just Istanbul, union with Europe would probably have happened already. Istanbul has been for centuries among the most metropolitan of all cities. It has served as the capital of three empires, the only one to astride two continents, the...

Thesis Advisor: Professor Michael Herzfeld This is a dissertation about the social negotiation of ethnicity and local resistance to the use of armed violence. Based on eighteen months of fieldwork between March 2000 and August 2001 in Skopje, Republic of Macedonia, I unfold the social processes related to ethnicity that can both escalate violence and hinder its escalation in multi-ethnic states in the Balkans. More specifically, I ask the following question. Given the social tensions between Macedonians and Albanians, why did an all-out ethnic war not sweep across Macedonia when the conflict between the Macedonian State Army and the Albanian National Liberation Army erupted in February 2001? By comparing the processes of Macedonian and Albanian ethnic identity building in an ethnically heterogeneous neighborhood, I make two arguments. First, I argue that reasons why civil wars in multi-ethnic societies are constrained lie with the schematics of minority social structures and in...