Archive 1986 – 2017

(B) Continued from PressInfo 129 Global brainstorm on a humanity-oriented Western policy Imagine that we begin a global brainstorm where people of all walks of life can contribute their opinions freely on questions such as: how can the United States, and the West in general, make a more efficient contribution to a world in peace, justice and human development? What new forums do we need — in the fields of politics, religion, education, culture, etc — to balance the globalisation in the economic sphere? How must we re-structure the world system to promote global democracy and democratic governance (for, by and with the peoples) to benefit all and not mainly Western people? We are talking about a new global policy for us all and not just for the biggest countries. We are talking about taking the idea of a global human family seriously when making decisions at home. We are...

(B) PressInfo 129 and 130 is our contribution to questions we find essential now: Can something positive come out of the terrible events in New York and Washington on September 11? Can the innocent victims of many nationalities and walks of life be honoured by hard thinking about a more peaceful world? Can this particular violence teach us something about the civilisational necessity to reduce violence before it is too late? We shall be happy if you find any inspiration here and we invite your constructive thoughts to tff@transnational.live. Two weeks have passed. We mourn the tragedy in New York and Washington. Innocent lives were taken by mad men who could not find intelligent, non-violent ways to make their point. No civilised goals can ever be promoted by such methods. No ideology and no religion in the world can justify them. There are those who argue that, at this very...

Is it possible for America to say ‘Sorry’? By JONATHAN POWER TFF PressInfo # 127 September 20, 2001 LONDON – How should the United States fight Osama bin Laden? It could start by saying sorry. Despite two centuries of rapid immigration pulling in people from all over the world, America remains a predominantly Christian nation. It is not a Jewish one and certainly not an Islamic one. It draws its inspiration from another book, mightier, it believes, than the Old Testament or the Koran, although it shares common roots with both these religions and worships the same God. If Christianity is not about saying sorry and turning the other cheek what, at the end of the day, is so special about it? We have a lot to be sorry for. After all it was Christian societies that practised slavery. It was a Christian society that tolerated the long persecution and...

Ferencz is a former prosecutor at the Nuremberg War Crimes Trial By Katy Clark,September 19, 2001 See other articles, letters and analyses by Benjamin Ferencz at http://www.benferencz.org Ferencz: Perhaps some of the tears have dried and people can begin to think rationally about the horrors of the past week and what we can do to prevent the recurrence of such tragedies. Katy Clark: Ben Ferencz has spent most of his 82 years doing just that. He was a prosecutor for the United States during the Nuremberg war crimes trials of Nazi leaders. Ferencz’s response to the Vietnam War was to withdraw from his private law practice and spend the rest of his life studying and writing about world peace. He founded the Pace Peace Center at Pace University, where he is Adjunct Professor of International Law. Ben Ferencz lives in New Rochelle, New York. You wrote this letter because you believe that...

Det er kun få forundt selv at rejse til konfliktområder og udvikle en egen forståelse og danne en egen opfattelse. De fleste er afhængige af dagblade, radio og TV. Derfor står medierne mellem os og begivenhederne. Hvad vi får er derfor ikke nødvendigvis en opfattelse af virkeligheden, men et billede af den, af en del af den, af nogle aspekter af den og vinkler på den og netop ikke af visse andre aspekter og vinkler. Det kan nok hverken være eller blive anderledes. Men! Hvad hvis dækningen er systematisk skæv, hvis der er en tendens i, hvad der dækkes og ikke dækkes? Nu er der igen en Balkankrise og igen er der nogen af os, som har været på åstedet i omkring 10 år, der spørger: har vi nu også en fri presse, som dem hjemme faktisk kan stole på ? Her kommer ca 20 spørgsmål/emner, som kunne have haft...

By Rabbi Michael Lerner RabbiLerner@tikkun.org Editor, Tikkun Magazine  There is never any justification for acts of terror against innocent civilians — it is the quintessential act of dehumanisation and not recognizing the sanctity of others, and a visible symbol of a world increasingly irrational and out of control. It’s understandable why many of us, after grieving and consoling the mourners, will feel anger – – and while some demagogues in Congress have already sought to manipulate that feeling into a growing militarism (more spies, legalize assassinations of foreign leaders, increase the defence budget at the expense of domestic programs), the more “responsible” leaders are seeking to narrow America’s response to targeted attacks on countries that allegedly harbour the terrorists. But though the perpetrators deserve to be punished, and I personally would be happy if all the people involved in this act were to be imprisoned for the rest of their...

By Scott Taylor  espritdecorp@idirect.comwww.espritdecorps.on.ca   TETOVO, Macedonia – August 09, 2001 As international envoys and Macedonian government officials try to hammer out a last-minute peace deal in the holiday resort Ohrid, fighting and violence continues to escalate across the country. On Wednesday, the ethnic-Albanian rebels (UCK) mounted a major offensive to cut the main highway between the capital of Skopje and the city of Tetovo. After suffering heavy casualties – 10 dead and 14 wounded in an ambush – Macedonian Security forces battled throughout the night to regain control of this vital route. Helicopter gunships pounded rebel villages and armoured columns inched their way up steep mountain paths to engage the UCK. By Thursday morning the highway was proclaimed secure, but a handful of still smoldering vehicles bore stark testimony to the violence of the previous day’s attacks. Angered by the news of the initial ambush, mobs of Macedonian citizens took...

Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) My first reaction was of incredulity: was I watching a movie or was this real? This was real. I was mesmerised. Then one of the Trade Centre’s towers collapsed. I fell deeply silent within myself, and an awareness of the suffering and grief all this was causing gripped me. Very many people are in deep grief for very many innocent lives have been lost by this act of terrorism, which was a dreadfully evil act. I uphold these people and all those in the administration of states who are responsible for responding to this crisis. Terrorism is indeed a threat to civilised societies and democracy and the following reflections should not be perceived as diminishing this conviction. My Buddhist training helps me to examine the causes of suffering and these include those causes of terrorism that are not entirely irrational. There is some basis for...

From articles in the Seikyo Shimbun, September 16 and 17 Ignorance is a dangerous thing. Without factual knowledge, stereotypes and the imagery they spawn invariably assume a momentum of their own, proliferating out of control. Just because the perpetrators of the appalling terrorist attacks are believed to be of Arab descent, I pray that people will not immediately jump to the conclusion that all Arabs are dangerous and that Islam encourages violence. It is in no way true that all 1.2 billion Muslims in the world are violent. Even the recent revival of Islam, which is sometimes confused with Islamic fundamentalism, is not a monolithic mass movement. The extremists constitute a very small minority; the vast majority are moderates. Obviously, every act of terrorism is reprehensible and wrong, regardless of its motive. Yet we absolutely must not treat terrorism as an inevitable consequence of faith in the tenets of Islam....

USA passerte noen år siden Romerriket i antallet militære intervensjoner i andre land. Av de rundt to hundre og tyve ganger USA har brukt militær makt mot andre stater kan muligens noen av dem forsvares ut fra Internasjonal Rett. De fleste er brudd på såvel folkeretten som de konvensjoner og lover som gjelder mår militær makt brukes. Dette gjelder såvel de midler som er benyttet som i hvilke situasjoner militær makt har vært tatt i bruk. Begge disse forhold er regulert i et flertall konvensjoner og avtaler. I tillegg har USA sjelden tatt hensyn til beslutninger i FNs Sikkerhetsråd, bortsett fra de ganger rådet har støttet USAs linje. I tillegg til de juridiske sidene ved disse overgrepene er mange av dem forkastelige fra moralske og politiske vurderinger. USA har vært militært aktive i alle verdensdeler i mange tiår og ekspanderer fortsatt med sine militære midler. NATOs utvidelse østover og den...

NATO vil ikke forlade Makedonien NATOs talsmænd understreger at Operation Essential Harvest i Makedonien er en meget begrænset mission, den skal kun være i Makedonien i en måned og kun indsamle 3300 våben. Det er ikke en overvågende, ikke en fredsbevarende, ikke en fredsskabende aktion. Og som vi har vist i TFF PressInfo 125 er det ikke en afvæbningsmission. Måske kunne man sige at det er en “indsaml-ikke-alt-for-mange-våben” mission. Når NATOs mission nærmer sig sin afslutning, må der forventes en intensiv media indsats for at understrege, at KLA/NLA/UCK har holdt deres løfte og afleveret 3300 våben. Det vil blive hilst velkommen af NATO og EU som et væsentligt skridt i retning af fred fra den side. Når man ser på sagens hele sammenhæng, er det imidlertid en meget rimelig hypotese, at begge parter vil anvende tiden produktivt til at anskaffe nye våben. Fordi: a) Makedonierne og regeringen har ingen som...

– thoughts of a TFF eyewitness in Washington Waking up yesterday to what seemed Hollywood images was unexpected, shocking, and also revealing of the vulnerability of the greatest super power in the world. I was just waking up from a weird dream about seeing a ufo in the sky and pointing it out to my father, when the phone rang and I was told the World Trade Center had been hit. I turned on the TV and there it was, no it was not a ufo, it was not a random accident, a highjacked plane was crashing against one of the towers. Minutes later tower number two gets hit by another highjacked plane. At this point it was clear this was a terrorist act. On my way to work at the CNN building I could see a big cloud of smoke as I drove through North Capitol. Then the radio...