International law

Discuss problems and improvements as part of the celebrations Jan Oberg December 10, 2023 I was asked by American-French Michèle de Gastyne, who runs Musique Universelle Arc-En-Ciel in Paris, to do a short video about human rights for a seminar she also organises on the occasion of the 75th Anniversary of the Declaration. Michèle works with a strong inspiration from the Japan-based lay Buddhist organisation, Soka-Gakkai and in the spirit of President Daisaku Ikeda, who has also been a TFF Associate since 1995. Daisaku Ikeda (1928-2023) was a Buddhist philosopher, peacebuilder, educator, author and poet who dedicated his life to promoting peace through dialogue and spearheaded the development of the Soka Gakkai as a community-based Buddhist organization of over 12 million members worldwide. Mr. Ikeda passed away peacefully on November 15, 2023, at the age of 95. I accepted this invitation with honour but also with a particular joy because...

December 3, 2023 Here is a very eloquent explanation of three underlying, non-material factors that explain how the occupier has built a mental self-defence that makes everything look normal and fine. Note Levy’s three very substantial points. More about Gideon Levy “Is Gideon Levy the most hated man in Israel or just the most heroic?” from The Independent 2010 and here Wikipedia about him.

[Prefatory Note: A slightly updated and modified interview on Gaza with Zeynep Busra Conkar, an Associate Producer of TRT World, published October 30, 2023, an important Turkish media platform. A link to a short audio excerpt: https://twitter.com/trtworld/status/1719078356577075573] TRT: Israel’s bloodlust shows international law is ‘a manipulated series of norms.’ Renowned International Law Professor Richard Falk says Western leadership becomes “self-righteous” to enforce international law “when it’s in their interest” while in other cases, they remain silent. TRT Introduction to Q & A follows. ”Many objective observers have noted that how Israel is using force against Gaza constitutes an ongoing case of genocide, which is itself considered the most serious of international crimes and deserves to be stopped by a consensus of inter-governmental action at the UN to stop this kind of extreme violent abuse of state power,” Falk said. As the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict enters its 24th day, claiming the...

Friends do not let friends commit crimes against humanity. Jeffrey Sachs November 10, 2023 Israel is running out of time to save itself—not from Hamas, which lacks the means to defeat Israel militarily, but from itself. Israel’s war crimes in Gaza, verging on the crime of genocide according to the Center for Constitutional Rights, threaten to destroy Israel’s civil, political, economic, and cultural relations with the rest of the world. There are growing calls in Israel for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to resign immediately. A new Israeli government should seize the opportunity to turn carnage into lasting peace through diplomacy. Netanyahu is leading Israel into the same trap that the U.S. fell into after 9/11. Hamas’ goal in its heinous terrorist attack on 10/7 was to goad Israel into a long and bloody war, and to induce Israel to commit war crimes to bring on the world’s opprobrium. This is...

Deeply moving and concise statement by Yanis Varoufakis October 8, 2023 The Nobel “Peace” Committee should have rewarded Julian Assange for his long service in fighting wars – by revealing how they are master-minded and fought with no connection to official explanations and narratives. It would then also have done something for the freedom of expression and human rights – including this hero’s right to live in freedom. But the NATO Norway Committee consists – in violation of the wish of Alfred Nobel – of former parliamentarians (and not of experts in peace as he mentioned) and has, therefore, no wish or ability to reward dissidents in the West or people who devote their lives to fight also US/NATO wars – as did Daniel Ellsberg. Shame upon the Committee! And thanks from our hearts to both Julian and Yanis. Jan ObergTFF director and editor of The Transnational

A facsimile of the signature-and-seals page of the 1864 Geneva Convention. Photograph Source: Kevin Quinn, Ohio, US – CC BY 2.0 Alfred De Zayas September 26, 2023 Progress and retrogression characterize the reality of international law, international relations, and the concrete enjoyment of human rights by women and men throughout the planet. We hail the tides of opportunity, the times of liberation and expansion, but we should not be blind to recurrent abuses, crimes, and moments of disgrace. Today our world is experiencing chaos, but not more so than in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. At least we are not burning witches or massacring indigenous Hopi, Pequots, Sioux, Quechua and Taínos, the slave trade is abolished, colonialism is drastically reduced. We welcome the landmark resolution 48/7 adopted by the UN Human Rights Council on 8 October 2021 concerning the legacies of colonialism in Africa, Asia and Latin America, particularly...

A collection of relevant articles brought to you by The Transnational Foundation. When will the investigative reports come, if not after one year? Jan Oberg September 26, 2023 The destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines had neither a photogenic character nor a death toll comparable with 9/11, 2001. It also did not provoke a German or Russian response in the vicinity of the totally out-of-proportion US Global War on Terror that has cost millions of innocent lives. That said, one could hypothesise that, as a destructive event and over time, this gigantic infrastructure destruction will have consequences for the international order as comprehensive as 9/11. Be this as it may, we’ve all noticed how this unique destruction disappeared very quickly from the media and has also not been mentioned in, say, statements from NATO, G7, G 20 or the EU. The world has also not heard anything from any formal...

Jan Oberg August 19, 2023 On August 19, 2023, it is 70 years ago that the US/CIA and others, with the assistance of their British peers, did one of its countless regime changes worldwide, namely in Iran: The U.S.- and UK-instigated, Iranian army-led overthrow of the democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in favour of strengthening the monarchical rule of the shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Here is Wikipedia’s detailed account of this shameful act. And with the exception of the years under the Shah’s rule, relations between the West and Iran have been utterly conflictual ever since, and every potential for cooperation has been squandered. The US has felt its usual exceptionalist privilege to harass the country decade after decade, telling it that it will never acquire nuclear weapons, which the US itself and Israel have plenty of – and which it’s doubtful that Iran ever wanted to acquire –...

This whole affair – this sad weaponisation of law in favour of the exceptionalist Western exceptional war criminals – can be debunked in about 4 minutes. See how below! That did not influence thousands of Western mainstream journalists, editors and what they call experts from talking at length about how important it would be to arrest President Putin. Did you ever hear the same people argue for just one in the series of Western lawbreakers/assumed war criminals? As is clearly pointed out by The South China Morning Post’s chief news editor, Yonden Lhatoo, in his intro, this is not a defence of Russia’s invasion. It’s a matter of exposing the West’s double standards. I find this as brilliant as exhaustive on the issue. I celebrate that it has been seen by so many. You can’t fool all the people all of the time… Jan Oberg, editor

Collage © Jan Oberg 2023 A list to be updated if and when Jan Oberg March 16, 2023 The human right to freely seek information is laid down in the American Convention on Human Rights from 1968. Article 13 states that “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought and expression. This right includes freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds.” The Universal Declaration of Human Rights from 1948 states in Article 19 that: “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.” The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1966 states in Article 19 that: “1) Everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference. 2) Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression;...

The Illegality of NATO: Violation of the UN Charter and the Nuremberg Principles John Scales Avery February 27, 2023 In recent years, participation in NATO has made European countries accomplices in US efforts to achieve global hegemony by means of military force, in violation of international law, and especially in violation of the UN Charter, the Nuremberg Principles. Former UN Assistant Secretary-General Hans Christof von Sponeck – also a TFF Associate – used the following words to express his opinion that NATO now violates the UN Charter and international law: “In the 1949 North Atlantic Treaty, the Charter of the United Nations was declared to be NATO’s legally binding framework.” However, the United Nations’ monopoly of the use of force, especially as specified in Article 51 of the Charter, was no longer accepted according to the 1999 NATO doctrine. NATO’s territorial scope, until then limited to the Euro-Atlantic region, was...

– the author Peter Peverelli TFF Associate September 22, 2022 This article was originally published by Chinasquare on September 21, 2022. In her annual speech (State of the Union), the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, further sharpened the relationship between the EU and China. She noted that democracy in the EU is under threat as hostile countries, notably Russia and China, fund organizations within the EU to carry out propaganda. She announced a package to defend democracy. von der Leyen had, unfortunately, constructed her entire speech from a negative perspective. A significant part was devoted to the war in Ukraine. It is certainly true that this has a strong negative effect on the lives of EU citizens, but instead of going into the background of this conflict and the possibilities of ending this war as soon as possible, she turned her focus on the enemy who...