TFF PressInfo

Jan Oberg December 7, 2021 Imagine that the Nobel Prize in Literature is given to a book publisher or papermaker and the official motivation is that publishers or papermakers are preconditions for the writer writing and being read. Roughly, this is how the Nobel Peace Committee, reasons – unreasonably. Here’s how it legitimates that its 2021 prize goes to Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov way outside the letter and spirit of Alfred Nobel’s will: “Without freedom of expression and freedom of the press, it will be difficult to successfully promote fraternity between nations, disarmament and a better world order to succeed in our time. This year’s award of the Nobel Peace Prize is therefore firmly anchored in the provisions of Alfred Nobel’s will.” See? – “without papermakers and publishers, it will be difficult to successfully write good literature and be read…” I believe my readers easily grasp just how far-fetched...

Jan Oberg December 1, 2021 This article is based on observations sent to me by an academic friend living in Italy who wants to be anonymous, given the views it expresses in this situation. The reason we publish it here with a few comments, videos and links is that it is obviously a very serious situation in and of itself but also an example of how democracy can quickly be undermined and how nonviolent demonstrations are squeezed out, framed as neo-Fascists and de-legitimated – as is the entire peace discourse in Western democracies (if we can still call them that). It’s an illustration of how far democratic governments seem ready to go in the direction of authoritarianism in the name of protecting their citizens – without giving those same citizens a chance to express themselves as part of the decision-making process. There is a huge risk that the fear of...

Daniel Ellsberg November 8, 2021 Given the intellectual and ethical status of many leaders in today’s world, this is not – as it may seem – a far-fetched question. It must be raised and discussed since the shocking revelation made by Daniel Ellsberg (1) earlier this year. In 1958, the US had a president – Dwight D. Eisenhower – who was himself a military man. Military people are often more cautious about war because they know much better than politicians what it would mean to start and fight a real war. What would Western leaders do today if a hard dilemma came up? The 12-min documentary below should – together with other articles we have published on this issue – serve as a wake-up call for those who believe that nuclear war is something that belongs only to the past. Young people who engage wonderfully in climate issues seem not...

Jan Oberg October 27, 2021 I’m 70 now and all my life, I’ve heard that the Russians would one day make a surprise attack and, within 48 hours, occupy the Eifel Tower. Fait accompli! We in the West were weak – perhaps not right now but we would be within the next 5 years if we did not invest much more in ”defence”. Well, these damn Russians haven’t come yet – another reason we shouldn’t trust them, I assume! The latest variation on that bizarre and irrational theme is that Swedish military spokespersons maintain that Sweden has to plan for an isolated Russian attack on the island of Gotland – and that China aims to conquer Taiwan and Biden telling the world that the US is committed to defend Taiwan. This is a slightly revised version of an editorial for the Transcend Media Service, October 25, 2021 The time when...

Jan Oberg October 21, 2021 This article is based on observations sent to me by an academic friend of mine who wants to be anonymous, given the views it expresses in this situation. The reason we publish it here with a few comments and links is that it is obviously a very serious situation in and of itself but also an example of how democracy can quickly be undermined and how nonviolent demonstrations are squeezed out, framed as neo-Fascists and de-legitimated – as is the entire peace discourse in Western democracies (if we can still call them that). Please note that we update this page and, by October 23, have added a lot of videos at the end of it. And more have been added on November 15. Press Release GREEN PASS – Cunial, Barillari: Request for asylum at the Swedish Embassy (Rome), Italians are political refugees Rome, 16 October...

A Critical Analysis Of A Report By The Newlines Institute And The Raoul Wallenberg Center On March 8, 2021, the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy in Washington published a report, The Uyghur Genocide: An Examination of China’s Breaches of the 1948 Genocide Convention in cooperation with the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights in Montreal. It states that ”This report is the first independent expert application of the 1948 Genocide Convention to the ongoing treatment of the Uyghurs in China. It was undertaken by the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy, in cooperation with the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, in response to emerging accounts of serious and systematic atrocities in Xinjiang province, particularly directed against the Uyghurs, an ethnic minority, to ascertain whether the People’s Republic of China is in breach of the Genocide Convention under international law.” The Report – hereafter The Report – has been produced with the contributions of, and upon...

We at TFF are proud to present one of our most amazing Associates who – in so many different ways – has worked for peace over 67 years. His knowledge is encyclopaedic and covers so many fields that it is hard to grasp. Even at the age of 88 and with various health problems and failing eyesight, he writes every day, most of the day – in the belief that we are all responsible for doing all that we can and that it is only through knowledge, humanity and vision we can survive in the long-term perspective as one humanity. The book you can download below runs over 500+ pages – and it’s just one of John’s many. It contains much more than the story of Avery’s work for peace: articles, essays, comments and whole books on various aspects of global affairs. Better scroll and browse and be inspired than...

Photo Oscar Keys, Unsplash Peter J. Peverelli October 5, 2021 Given that human rights issues have always been central in the international discourse and in the Cold Wars between NATO and the Soviet Union/Russia and now in the new US/NATO China Cold War Agenda, we believe it is important to discuss how the concept of human rights – and the Universal Declaration – is itself a cultural construct based on certain values and how the implementation of human rights must vary according to history, cultural values and ways of thinking, or social cosmology. Peter Peverelli has worked with and in China for about 45 years and is also a leading expert on human rights at the Cross-Cultural Human Rights Centre at Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. We are grateful for his permission to publish this research paper from 2016. Abstract The title of the official document of what is generally known...

Neta C. Crawford Listen to this article here September 24, 2021 The U.S. invaded Afghanistan in late 2001 to destroy al-Qaida, remove the Taliban from power and remake the nation. On Aug. 30, 2021, the U.S. completed a pullout of troops from Afghanistan, providing an uncertain punctuation mark to two decades of conflict. For the past 11 years I have closely followed the post-9/11 conflicts for the Costs of War Project, an initiative that brings together more than 50 scholars, physicians and legal and human rights experts to provide an account of the human, economic, budgetary and political costs and consequences of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Originally published by The Conversation Of course, by themselves figures can never give a complete picture of what happened and what it means, but they can help put this war in perspective. The 20 numbers highlighted below, some drawn from figures released on Sept. 1, 2021,...

Listen to this article Richard Falk September 14, 2021 Modified responses on Aug. 23rd to questions posed by Zahra Mirzafarjouyan, Mehr News Agency, and originally published on Falk’s homepage. • 1 Why could the Taliban capture Kabul and gain power so rapidly without considerable resistance from people and the army? The U.S. led NATO Afghan intervention and occupation was flawed in mission from its outset in 2001, and indeed in the period before the attack and large-scale, ambitious regime-changing, state-building occupation. In the post-colonial world, the military superiority of Western intervening powers has proved unable to shape the political outcomes of a prolonged struggle for the control of non-Western sovereign spaces, especially if the society is beset by unresolved tribal and ethnic conflicts, as well as by warlordism and drug cartels. In Afghanistan, as elsewhere, this line of observation proved to be once again validated, despite trillions of dollars spent...

Hear this on Spotify John Pilger September 9, 2021 More than a generation ago, Afghanistan won its freedom, which the U.S., Britain and their “allies” destroyed. As a tsunami of crocodile tears engulfs Western politicians, history is suppressed. More than a generation ago, Afghanistan won its freedom, which the United States, Britain and their “allies” destroyed. In 1978, a liberation movement led by the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) overthrew the dictatorship of Mohammad Dawd, the cousin of King Zahir Shah. It was an immensely popular revolution that took the British and Americans by surprise. Foreign journalists in Kabul, reported The New York Times, were surprised to find that “nearly every Afghan they interviewed said [they were] delighted with the coup.” The Wall Street Journal reported that “150,000 persons … marched to honor the new flag … the participants appeared genuinely enthusiastic.” The Washington Post reported that “Afghan loyalty to the government can...

1. The World After the Corona. 2. How Militarism Fuels Climate Change.3. The Military-Industrial-Media-Academic Complex (MIMAC).4. China, the Belt & Road Initiative And the West. 5. The Balkans and the Purpose of NATO.6. Nuclearism, the Threat of Nuclear Weapons and What To Do. Fortunately, they are also open to anyone anywhere in the world. More about this unique, topical series on this link where you must also register to participate in the global discussion. The idea is that you watch the lecture below first and then participate in the discussion about it. You register on the above link. If you read this after the six Zoominars have taken place – just watch the lectures and discussion below. Under each video lecture below, find the discussion that took place with hundreds of people worldwide on Zoom and over 300 on Facebook Live. About the weapons in and of themselves, the existential...