Articles by UN
We found 3962 results.
Steve Jobs’ 2005 Stanford Commencement Address
Stanford University – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Oct 2011
Drawing from some of the most pivotal points in his life, Steve Jobs, chief executive officer and co-founder of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, urged graduates to pursue their dreams and see the opportunities in life’s setbacks — including death itself — at the university’s 114th Commencement on June 12, 2005.
→ read full articleThe Right to Exist: Why Kosovo But Not Palestine?
Zoltan Grossman - ConterPunch,
10 Oct 2011
The United Nations has not d Kosovo because it would set a negative precedent for unilateral secession around the world. Many states in the Arab League and European Union, on the other hand, view Kosovo as a positive precedent for Palestine. Some governments may oppose sovereignty for both Kosovo and Palestine. But the US is virtually alone in its backing for the State of Kosovo, while at the same time hypocritically blocking a State of Palestine.
→ read full articleAfghan and German Deep Cultures at War
Johan Galtung, 10 Oct 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Oct 2011
Let Afghans be Afghans. Hold the Swiss model high. Let muslims help muslims. Stop the nonsense about running the world from Central Asia; let central Asians find their own form. Germany has a message, and it is Article 23, unification; by Schengen borders. And Martin Luther’s preface to the first printed Qur’an, in Latin, Basel 1541.
→ read full articleOf Bases and Budgets
Christine Ahn and Hyun Lee – Foreign Policy in Focus,
10 Oct 2011
Why, after 66 years, 28,500 U.S. troops remain on 87 bases and installations on the Korean peninsula and whose security they are safeguarding.
→ read full article13 Ways to Look at the Occupation of Wall Street
Charles M. Young – Nation of Change,
3 Oct 2011
5) I think that the corporate press has a difficult time understanding Occupy Wall Street because, like 99% of Americans, they have no experience with democracy. They spend most of their time enslaved by large totalitarian collectives known as “corporations” and have never once decided anything for themselves as a group of equal workers. Instead they follow orders and write about elections, which are big puppet shows financed and scripted by Wall Street.
→ read full articleThe Dead Begin to Speak Up In India
Arundhati Roy – The Guardian,
3 Oct 2011
So somebody who wants to invest in a dam, or build a steel plant or a buy a bauxite mine is not considered a security hazard, whereas a scholar who might wish to participate in a seminar about, say, displacement or communalism or rising malnutrition in a globalised economy, is. Terrorists with bad intentions have probably guessed that they are better off wearing Prada suits and pretending they want to buy a mine than admitting that they want to attend a seminar.
→ read full articleAnd Then the Decline and Fall of China?
Johan Galtung,
3 Oct 2011
Talk given in Beijing at the Party School of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, 27 Sep 2011 – Yet a rule is written in the stars: nothing human is forever. There is an organic curve: birth-rise-peak-decline-fall. China is human if at a higher level: the comparative advantage of China is not cheap labor or such economisms but the culture, drawing on the san fa, the three teachings of daoism-confucianism-buddhism. The Occident would have been much better off drawing on judaism-christianity-islam and secularism instead of wasting time fighting each other to death.
→ read full article(Italian) Libia Scontata
Johan Galtung – Il Manifesto,
3 Oct 2011
La rivolta scatenata dai ribelli di Bengasi contro Gheddafi è parte di un disegno neo-imperiale condotto in prima fila dalla Nato e dall’Europa per assumere il controllo delle risorse del Nordafrica.
→ read full article(German) Die Macht der Bilder von 9/11: Zeugen wider Willen
Constantin Binder – Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung,
26 Sep 2011
Den Bildern des 11. September konnte keiner entkommen – genau, wie es die Terroristen wollten. Doch welche Rolle spielten die Medien dabei? Und welche Rolle sollten sie spielen? Ein Essay unseres Redakteurs Constantin Binder.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Dez Teses Sobre Dez Anos Perdidos
Johan Galtung, 12 Set 11 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Sep 2011
Tese 9: A República dos EUA, pela sua reação ao 11/9, acelerou muito seu processo de auto destruição. Os Patriot Acts I e II, a vigilância implacavel da população americana e outras, torturas e rendições extraordinárias, tudo isto destrói o espírito democrático de dentro para fora, além da destruição da economia por três guerras extremamente caras. (teses 2-4).
→ read full articleActivism Anthem
Bhuchung Sonam – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Sep 2011
I have principle and no power
You have power and no principle
You being you
And I being I…
New Law Prohibits Practice of Female Genital Mutilation in Guinea-Bissau
Iain Murray, UNICEF – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Sep 2011
This past June [2011], the National Popular Assembly (ANP) of Guinea-Bissau approved a law prohibiting female genital mutilation and cutting (FGM/C) nationwide. The controversial law had been on the table for discussion for 16 years, before it was ultimately approved by 64 votes in favour to 1 vote against.
→ read full article(German) „Zehn verlorene Jahre“
Constantin Binder - Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung,
26 Sep 2011
Friedensforscher Galtung kritisiert Vorgehen der USA nach 9/11
→ read full articleA (North) East Asian Community
Johan Galtung, 26 Sep 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Sep 2011
Northeast Asia Peace and Development Forum. Dalian, China, 24 Sep 11 – There is the negative peace of reconciliation after the traumas of the past and mediating ongoing conflicts; and the positive peace of cooperation for mutual and equal benefit, harmony, and integration-fusion. Across this diverse geographical-historical-cultural space there is an East Asian similarity: social-economic human rights first, civil-political later–the Chinese “opening up”. Any (N)EAC would search for cooperation with the USA on equal terms, including observer status; but by no stretch of imagination is it a (North)East Asian country. The times when the USA could also claim membership in Latin America, Europe and Asia are gone.
→ read full articleChina’s Peaceful Development (Full Text)
Information Office of the State Council, The People's Republic of China – TRANSCEND Media Servivce,
26 Sep 2011
At the beginning of the second decade of the 21st century and on the occasion of the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China (CPC), China declared solemnly again to the world that peaceful development is a strategic choice made by China to realize modernization, make itself strong and prosperous, and make more contribution to the progress of human civilization. China will unswervingly follow the path of peaceful development.
→ read full articleMonsanto’s Cotton Strategy Wears Thin
April Davila – United Nations University,
19 Sep 2011
When pulling on their pants in the morning, most people don’t think about Monsanto. When it was first introduced in 1996, Monsanto’s genetically engineered (GE) cotton seemed like a dream come true. However, after the first harvest of Monsanto’s GE cotton, outraged American farmers began filing lawsuits against Monsanto, claiming that the company misrepresented the effectiveness of their product.
→ read full articleIn Paraguay a Familiar Story is Playing Out
Sean O’ Leary – Council on Hemispheric Affairs,
19 Sep 2011
In Paraguay, the Ayoreo people are fighting for their very survival. These indigenous people are struggling to save their ancestral home in the Chaco region from cattle companies, farmers and religious sects who are moving into the region and clearing the land.
→ read full articleJapan, Article 9 and the Self-Defense Forces
Johan Galtung,
19 Sep 2011
How about a fourth possible use of Self-Defense Forces, as a nonviolent peace force? Without arms, of course, protecting civilians, accompanying them, based on solid training, exercises, courage? They might even be superior to nonmilitary often short on those three. Disaster relief, development, defensive defense, nonviolent peace force–all preferably reciprocal–could transform the military on the way to its abolition, like in the 30 states without armies. Add training in reconciliation, mediation and peace-building and Japan would have a formidable peace force.
→ read full articleHuman Rights in Sri Lanka: Impunity against Accountability and Justice
Nirmanusan Balasundaram, Groundviews - TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Sep 2011
“There are two mistakes one can make along the road to truth…not going all the way, and not starting.” – Lord Buddha.
→ read full article(Italian) La Strategia della Monsanto sul Cotone per Farci Vestire Leggeri
April Davila – United Nations University,
19 Sep 2011
Quando fu introdotto nel 1996, il cotone geneticamente modificato (Genetically Engineered, GE) della Monsanto sembrava un sogno divenuto realtà. Tuttavia, dopo il primo raccolto di cotone GE della Monsanto, gli indignati agricoltori americani hanno intentato azioni legali, poi archiviate, contro la Monsanto, sostenendo che l’azienda aveva mistificato l’efficacia dei propri prodotti.
→ read full articleKilling, Denial and Manipulation
Gladson Dungdung – Gandhi Foundation,
19 Sep 2011
When I completed this piece [30 Aug 2011], a report in the newspaper stated that the Adivasis of Tholkabad village in Saranda Forest have vacated their village in fear of the police torture. Right from when I started writing on so-called anti-Naxal operations, I have been mentioning that the ‘Operation Green Hunt’ was launched with the clear intention to create fear, insecurity and livelihood crisis in the villages. The Jharkhand government has allotted iron-ore to 19 steel companies including Mittal, Jindal, Tata, Atro-Steel and Torian in Saranda Forest. Therefore, of course, they want to clear the land.
→ read full articleUNHCR Launches Campaign to Combat Statelessness
UN High Commissioner for Refugees – TRANSCEND Media Service,
12 Sep 2011
Around the world today there are millions of people who are not recognized as citizens of any country. On paper they don’t exist anywhere. They are people without a nationality, stateless. Statelessness may be caused by gender, when countries do not recognize the nationality of a woman due to discriminatory laws. Statelessness may be inherited, by children born to stateless parents. It may be created in newly formed states, such as South Sudan, by intentional or unintentional legislative exclusion of any ethnic groups.
→ read full articleEgypt’s Military Ruler Tantawi and the American Siege of Gaza
Ali Abunimah – Pambazuka News,
12 Sep 2011
Revelations from WikiLeaks – As a WikiLeaks cable reveals, the US was even more actively involved than originally thought in ‘enforcing the siege of Gaza along Egypt’s border’.
→ read full article9/11: Ten Theses on Ten Lost Years
Johan Galtung,
12 Sep 2011
9/11 itself set the tone for the decade: violence as a tool of politics backfires. The media reported war-violence with no analysis, no proposals. The economic contradictions accumulated, as did military non-victories, increasing non-attention, and increasing lack of faith in the USA as “exceptional”. The magic was gone.
→ read full articleUS Plans Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Test on International Day of Peace
David Krieger – Nuclear Age Peace Foundation,
5 Sep 2011
The General Assembly declared in its Resolution 55/282 that “the International Day of Peace [21 September] shall henceforth be observed as a day of global ceasefire and non-violence, an invitation to all nations and people to honor a cessation of hostilities for the duration of the Day.” The United States has announced that its next test of a Minuteman III will occur on September 21, 2011. So, on the 2011 International Day of Peace, the United States has chosen not “to honor a cessation of hostilities,” but rather to implement a very visible, $20 million test of a nuclear-capable missile.
→ read full articleI’d Rather Not Be Anna
Arundhati Roy – The Hindu,
29 Aug 2011
While his means maybe Gandhian, his demands are certainly not.
→ read full articleA Response to Arundhati Roy’s “I’d rather not be Anna”
Dr Felix Patel – Gandhi Foundation,
29 Aug 2011
What we see in the Anna phenomenon is a reduction of Gandhi’s fasting technique to a ridiculous extreme, superbly manipulated by the media. I can’t agree that the essence of Gandhi was in this fasting trick though, or that a public threat to fast to death is necessarily “violent violence”.
→ read full articleWe Have Been Here Before
Johan Galtung,
29 Aug 2011
At the time of writing what BBC and NATO call the Final Chapter is being written in the Libya-Gaddafi tragedy. Like the final chapter for Yugoslavia-Milosevic, for Afghanistan-Omar, for Iraq-Saddam, for War on Terror-bin Laden; get The Bad One. There will come more final chapters in this neo-crusade. Like in the 1090s crusade, orthodox christians were also target of their “mission”.
→ read full articleThey Talk the Talk, But Baulk at the Walk
Dr Maung Zarni – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Aug 2011
Twenty three years since Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the then freshly minted popular dissident, began her impassioned calls for a resolution to the country’s long-standing problems through dialogue, we seem to have been conditioned like a Pavlovian four-limbed creature.
→ read full articleThe Decline of the West?
Johan Galtung - TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Aug 2011
The basic G8-G20 mistake: obsessed with saving the banks through bailouts, they did not save people through stimulus. Learn from China: enter communities with the public-private-civil-technical sectors, jointly making mini-companies for basic needs–food and water, clothes and housing, clinics and schools–employing the most needy. A communist uplift from misery, and an increase in their buying power in the capitalist economy. Capi-communism. Rather decline than learning from China? Then, so be it.
→ read full article7/22: From Violence to Peace Culture (1)
Johan Galtung,
15 Aug 2011
Dear World Humanist Congress Participants, Fellow Humanists: We believe in the primacy of human life and we believe in rationality. Violence is contempt for life as our poet Nordahl Geieg puts it. You have chosen as the theme of this conference “Humanism and Peace”, and chosen me–rightly or wrongly considered by many the father of peace studies–to deliver this address “From Lack of Realism to Conflict Resolution”.
→ read full articleNorway 7/22 – And What Now?
Johan Galtung - TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Aug 2011
After more than 50 interviews on the 7/22 events in Norway, here is one as editorial-with Swedish free lance journalist Ditte Lundberg.
→ read full articleHow Best to Remove Guns from Post-Conflict Zones?
IRIN News (UN) – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Aug 2011
Cash for guns or buy-back programmes in post-conflict states have fallen out of favour as a method of ridding a society of weapons, and have been replaced by often elaborate schemes designed to remove money from the equation, but the debate continues as to the best way forward.
→ read full articleCan Africa Develop a Regional Response to ‘Resource Grabbing’?
Rebecca M.E. Pointer – Another countryside,
8 Aug 2011
Evidence that a new wave of massive land (and water and other raw material) grabs are taking place across Africa is now incontrovertible. Estimates range from 32 to 50 million hectares of African land being allocated in long-term leases to foreign private and public companies in the last two years.
→ read full article(Italian) OIC: Organizzazione Islamica C = Conferenza-Cooperazione-Comunità?
Abbas Aroua e Johan Galtung, 18 luglio 2011 – TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Aug 2011
L’idea di collettività di stati è inclusa nella Carta delle Nazioni Unite per promuovere una transizione dal mondo del 1945 a quello odierno. Ma ancor meglio sarebbe una democrazia di stati membri “Uniti per la Pace”, con nessun sabotaggio dalle potenze che vivono nel passato.
→ read full articleNorway the Victim. Norway the Perpetrator.
Johan Galtung - TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Aug 2011
Dialogos, theologos. We are mourning, in churches, some in mosques–how about mourning together? The mezquita in Córdoba, with muslim service on Fridays, christian on Sundays, joint services on Saturdays? And in the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, building on Erdögan-Zapatero Alliance of Civilizations? Whites and blacks worked together in Southern USA at great risks; moving the USA forward. Show islamophobes, like Breivik, in Oslo, in Washington, and islamists, that dialogue and cooperation are possible. Invite them to join. Moving the world forward.
→ read full articleEurope’s Homegrown Terrorists
Gary Younge – The Nation,
1 Aug 2011
Two weeks after the fatal terrorist attacks of July 7, 2005, in London, and one day after another failed attack, a student, Jean Charles de Menezes, was in the London Underground when plainclothes police officers gave chase and shot him seven times in the head. Initial eyewitness reports said he was wearing a suspiciously large puffa jacket on a hot day and had vaulted the barriers and run when asked to stop.
→ read full articleCrocodile Tears As Food Aid Blockade Continues in Horn of Africa
Thomas C. Mountain – Foreign Policy Journal,
25 Jul 2011
As predicted here in Foreign Policy Journal, crocodile tears have begun to run down the faces of the likes of Anthony Lake, CIA director nominee turned Executive Director of UNICEF, as some 15 million people starve in the Horn of Africa. Tony Lake appeals to the world for tens, no, hundreds of millions of dollars to save the starving people of Ethiopia and Somalia, never once telling you that the majority, some 10 million, are in the Ogaden and Oromia regions and being subjected to a Western-funded food aid blockade by the Ethiopian military.
→ read full articleNorway 7/22. What? And Then What?
Johan Galtung, 25 Jul 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Jul 2011
Why did he not hit an immigration agency, mosques, muslim meetings? His thinking neither reflects nor is reflected by Norway’s political landscape. In Norway a loner, a nazi. But, let us not narrow the interpretation horizon to one point. On one end is the islamophobic loner with links to some groups. If he could be defined as crazy, the political brunt is removed. He becomes a causa sui, his own cause. On the other end is the islamist Helper of the Global Jihad a bankrupt Washington could use to get money for “war against terror”. And in-between is Breivik, at some stage using Libya as a cover, and they at some stage him as a bomber? A tacit cooperation?
→ read full article
Imagine – Playing for Change (VIDEO OF THE WEEK)
John Lennon, Songs around the World – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Jul 2011
In the beginning of 2010 the Playing for Change crew began work on a new Song around the World, John Lennon’s “Imagine.” It has been an amazing year of production, taking the crew from the favelas of Brazil to the shrines of southern India, from villages in Nepal to the glittering urban landscape of Tokyo and New York, and beyond. This song is the Playing For Change Foundation’s gift to the world.
→ read full articleOIC: Organization of Islamic Conference-Cooperation-Community?
Abbas Aroua & Johan Galtung, 18 Jul 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Jul 2011
The new OIC of cooperation will pose a major challenge to the UN. Of the five present Security Council veto powers, four are christian (one evangelical, one anglican, one catholic-secular, one orthodox), and one daoist-confucian-buddhist. OIC outsizes them all, even China. This is not only totally unfair, taking into account that the borders fragmenting the islamic community were mainly drawn by those Western powers, but also makes UNSC resolutions against muslim countries illegitimate. Muslim veto power could have saved many human lives, and the USA-West against unwise policies, and opened for a more balanced UN and more regional action.
→ read full article(Portuguese) WSPA Faz Apelo Mundial Pela Proibição de Animais em Circos
Sociedade Mundial de Proteção Animal - TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Jul 2011
Animais não são adequados para espetáculos circenses – é o que afirma a WSPA (World Society for the Protection of Animals) ao debater sobre as medidas políticas que estão sendo tomadas no Brasil e no Reino Unido.
→ read full article(Castellano) Distraido de la Vida
Facundo Cabral – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Jul 2011
Hay tantas cosas para gozar y nuestro paso en la tierra es tan corto, que sufrir es una pérdida de tiempo. Tenemos para gozar la nieve del invierno y la flor de la primavera, el chocolate de la Peruggia, la baguette francesa, los tacos mexicanos, el vino chileno , los mares y los ríos, el fútbol de los brasileros y los cigarros de Davidoff, las mil y una noches, La Divina Comedia, El Quijote, Pedro Páramo, los boleros de Manzanero, la poesía de Whitman… Mahler, Brahms, Mozart, Chopin, Beethoven, Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Velásquez, Cézanne, y Picasso… entre tantas maravillas. Si tienes alguna ENFERMEDAD SERIA, pueden pasar dos cosas, las dos son buenas…
→ read full article(Portuguese) Cronica – Guia Para se Livrar de Um Zumbi
Ivan Lessa - Colunista da BBC Brasil,
11 Jul 2011
Nesta semana que viu um centenário jornal bater as botas e ir para a cucuia (meu estilo é popular como um tabloide de Rupert Murdoch), optei por falar da imprensa alternativa, que mencionei na coluna de sexta-feira, sob a forma simpática e inofensiva do jornal de bairro, uma tradição sem grampos, escândalos ou mulher pelada na terceira página. Leviandade por leviandade, eu prefiro as minhas “traje passeio”, conforme se dizia.
→ read full articleThe West Has a Peace Theory – And a Bad One
Johan Galtung,
11 Jul 2011
Western peace theory is based on three state attributes: the Rule of Law, Human Rights, and Democracy. The logical flaw is clear: these are attributes of states, not of the relations between them–like equitable-horizontal vs. inequitable-vertical. One relation is in multilateral organizations like the UN. Does that relation include control of Big Powers? Answer: No. Does it guarantee qualified majority General Assembly votes Uniting for Peace? Answer: No. Does it guarantee that nationals of any country accused of crimes against peace, humanity and–new–nature, can be prosecuted? Answer: No.
→ read full article(Castellano) La No-violencia: Negativa vs. Positiva
Johan Galtung, 27 de Junio de 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Jul 2011
La no-violencia negativa incluye todas las formas de acción en contra, menos la violencia física, como la no-cooperación, la desobediencia civil, la infracción de las leyes, la declaración y la práctica de la autonomía. Y la no-violencia positiva incluye el esclarecimiento del pasado a través de la conciliación, del presente a través de la mediación de conflictos peligrosos, y la construcción de un futuro a través de la participación equitativa en proyectos positivos. Las dos formas no son exclusivas, un Gandhi, un Martin Luther King hicieron ambas cosas.
→ read full articleUgandan Farmers Reject Genetically Modified Crops
David Kazungu – Daily Monitor, Uganda,
4 Jul 2011
Farmers in the eastern districts of Uganda rejected a proposal by Mr. Arthur Makala, the executive director at Science Foundation for Livelihoods and Developments, to start engaging in the cultivation of genetically modified crops. He had suggested that farmers should embrace the Genetically Modified Crops [GMC] for better yields but the farmers rejected it saying GMCs are contaminated with chemicals that may be harmful to their health.
→ read full articleRule of Law vs. Rule of Mediation
Johan Galtung, 4 Jul 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Jul 2011
A fresh wind of a culture of mediation is blowing all over Latin America, more than in any other continent. All over there are huge conferences, workshops and training in family mediation, between neighbors, communal mediation, in work relations; less so at the inter-nation and inter-state levels. Judicial mediation is on everybody’s lips. This is great! A culture of mediation is a key part of a culture of conflict transformation–transforming conflicts so that they become manageable without violence–in turn a key part of the general culture of peace called for by UNESCO. Why so important?
→ read full article(Castellano) El Envejecimiento, no la Superpoblación…
Johan Galtung, 13 Junio 2011 – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Jun 2011
… será la tendencia dominante de la demografía del siglo XXI, escribe Gérard François Dumont en Le Monde Diplomatique, de junio de 2011.
→ read full articleNonviolence: Negative vs. Positive
Johan Galtung, 27 Jun 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Jun 2011
Both are forms of power. Negative nonviolence tries to stop the other side’s direct or structural violence whereas positive nonviolence tries to make the antagonist start being peaceful. Negative nonviolence includes all forms of action against, short of physical violence, like non-cooperation, civil obedience, breaking laws, declaring and practicing autonomy. And positive nonviolence includes clearing the past through conciliation, the present through mediation of dangerous conflicts, and building a future through equitable participation in positive projects. They are not exclusive; a Gandhi, a Martin Luther King did both.
→ read full articleWhat a Book!
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Jun 2011
Peace Processes: A Sociological Approach by John D. Brewer – From Anglo-America the world is used to books about how what they see as Western attributes–rule of law, human rights, democracy–are not only sufficient to bring about peace, but necessary, indispensable. That the USA, the UK, and Israel have much of that and yet are among the most belligerent countries in the world is handled not by reexamining the thesis, but by claiming self-defense, against the envy of those with deficits.
→ read full articleLibya: Deep Structure and the Surface
Johan Galtung, 20 Jun 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Jun 2011
Killing civilians to save civilian lives, and demolishing the parliament building to promote democracy, do not communicate well the pretended purpose. When only monarchs, emirs, and other dictators favor US-Israel policy, and even Morocco moves to constitutional monarchy? When Tunisia-Egypt-Yemen-Bahrain-Saudi-Syria-Iraq defy the USA? Option: extrajudicial execution of demonized leaders – a sure vote-getter.
→ read full article(Castellano) Fukushima 11-M – ¿Un punto de inflexión?
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Jun 2011
La Zona Cero fue un océano cero, y el país que dio al mundo la palabra “tsunami” fue golpeado por uno de hasta 41 metros de altura. Y Fukushima Dai-ichi, una de las 54 centrales nucleares de Japón, con seis unidades, 1-6; estaba en la playa, ofreciéndose a la furia primordial del tsunami.
→ read full articleBahrain’s Dictatorship and the Pentagon
Jacob G. Hornberger – Future of Freedom Foundation,
20 Jun 2011
What distinguishes the Bahrain dictatorship from, say, the Libyan or Syrian dictatorships, is that the U.S. government supports the dictatorship in Bahrain while opposing the Libyan and Syrian dictatorships. Thus, not only does U.S. foreign aid flow into the Bahrain dictatorship, the U.S. military also has a major base there. The Bahrain dictatorship is accusing those 20 doctors of participating in anti-government protests in Bahrain. Guess what type of court the doctors are being tried in. You got it: a military tribunal, just like those employed by the Pentagon at Guantanamo Bay.
→ read full article(Castellano) ¿HUMANITARIA, o INTERVENCIÓN?
Johan Galtung, 30 de Mayo de 2011 – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Jun 2011
El problema está en el término “intervención humanitaria”. “Humanitaria” está bien: proteger a las víctimas de la matanza y de la represión autocrática. Luego viene la parte “intervención”.
→ read full articleAging, Not Overpopulation…
Johan Galtung, 13 Jun 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Jun 2011
…will be the dominant tendency of the 21st century demography. By depriving people of work, forcing them into jobs and retirement, we produce health problems that tax strained economies further. Work is a fine mode of living; jobs may be necessary burdens. Money is used to bribe us into jobs for our livelihood. A rational society would have a living income for all, for food, clothing and housing, free health services, free education from Kindergarten to PhD; making us free to work.
→ read full articleEconomic Attacks against Arab Democracy
Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in Palestine – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Jun 2011
In their latest documents and meetings, the G8, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund reacted to the democratic movements in the Arab world: The recipe calls – as it did before the popular ousting of the Tunisian and Egyptian presidents – for privatization, austerity measures and “market liberation”.
→ read full article(Castellano) America la Bella
Johan Galtung, 23 de mayo de 2011 – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Jun 2011
¿Qué es lo que caracteriza, de modo específico, único, a los EE.UU.? Es la gente, ¡estúpido! Los americanos – disculpas a América Latina – América, la bella. ¿Cómo? ¿Qué? ¿Por qué? Vamos a intentarlo. Empezando con un hecho fundamental: con nadie en el mundo es tan fácil, no aburrido, hablar como con un americano. Abiertos, con nombres propios, sin barreras, lenguaje corporal y lenguaje verbal con encanto, contacto visual directo.
→ read full articleTowards the Eradication of Global Hunger and Undernutrition
Xin-Ying Ren and Fred Dubee, UN MaximsNews – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Jun 2011
While we tend to think in terms of hundreds of millions of deprived and stunted lives, the reality is that each starving child, each malnourished expectant mother, each person who does not have the energy to develop, learn or contribute is a horrible tragedy, and together these individual tragedies add up to an unacceptable loss to the human commonwealth. Simply stated hunger and undernutrition are among the most severe and least addressed challenges facing humanity today.
→ read full articleFukushima 3/11 – A Turning Point?
Johan Galtung - TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Jun 2011
We had 9/11; now we also have 3/11, March 11 2011 (AT 1446), the triple seaquake-tsunami-radiation disaster. Ground zero was an ocean zero, and the country that gave the world the word “tsunami” was hit by one up to 41 meters high. And there was Fukushima Dai-ichi, one of Japan’s 54 nuclear power plants, with six units, 1-6; on the beach, offering itself to the primordial rage of the tsunami.
→ read full article(Castellano) Chile: Senado Vendió a Monsanto la Semilla Campesina e Indígena
Lucía Sepúlveda Ruiz - Movimiento Anti Nuevo Orden Mundial (NWO),
30 May 2011
Con 13 votos a favor (de la derecha y uno de la Concertación), 5 en contra y 6 abstenciones, el Senado de Chile aprobó el 11 de mayo [2011] el Convenio Upov 91 que impedirá a los campesinos guardar la semilla y extenderá el tiempo de vigencia de los derechos y garantías de las transnacionales que vendan semillas híbridas y transgénicas en el país.
→ read full articleHumanitarian, or Intervention?
Johan Galtung,
30 May 2011
We are now more than two months into what may last two decades. Surgical cruise missiles fired from aircraft carriers on identified Libyan aircraft might have made some sense, but the Western construct demands regime change “by all necessary means”; not all humanitarian. The price is occupation, deep intervention. By the wayside of history are all the offers of ceasefires and negotiations, lost opportunities. And any deeper understanding that might lead to more positive pursuits.
→ read full articleLatin America Progresses Forward- A Victory for Gay Rights
Katie Soltis – Council on Hemispheric Affairs,
30 May 2011
The recent victories for gay rights exemplify the considerable progress toward the region’s consolidation of democracy. The three Latin American countries that have now legalized same-sex unions—Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay—were each ruled by repressive military regimes just over two decades ago.
→ read full articleStalin’s Discs Torment Mainstream Media
NameNotFound – Russia Today,
30 May 2011
Joseph Stalin and Nazi doctor Josef Mengele joined forces and bred deformed children who looked like aliens but were able to fly advanced aircraft like Top Gun pilots. No, seriously. I read it in a book written by “a national security reporter and contributing editor to The Los Angeles Times Magazine”, one Annie Jacobsen. I kid you not. The quote is from the New York Times review of her book.
→ read full article(Castellano) ¿Qué pasó con la izquierda occidental?
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 May 2011
La izquierda occidental ha de abrirse, no sólo limitarse a recitar “¡Globalización NO!” Un No no lleva a ningún lado. Se necesitan algunos Sí. Y creatividad.
→ read full articleThe Reckoning: Press Freedom in Sri Lanka
Nirmanusan Balasundaram – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 May 2011
We are living in a world where committed journalists write the news not only with ink, but also with their blood. This is the very reason that their souls still exist with us even after their tragic deaths. Sri Lanka is the very recent example for such context. Thirty-four journalists and media workers have been killed with no recourse to justice since the United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government came into power in April 2004 with the present President Mahinda Rajapaksa as its prime minister.
→ read full articleIndia: Tribes and Tribulations
Graham Davey – Gandhi Foundation,
23 May 2011
How do we bring peace and justice to the dispossessed and who is responsible?
→ read full articleAmerica the Beautiful
Johan Galtung, 23 May 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 May 2011
What is the US-specific pattern, what is unique, what is that IT? It is the people, stupid! The Americans–apologizing to Latin America–Americans, the beautiful. How? What? Why? Let us try. Starting with a basic: nobody in the world is so easy, not stuffy to talk with as an American. Open, first name basis, fences down, body language and verbal language charming, direct eye contact.
→ read full article(Castellano) Osama y Obama
Johan Galtung – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 May 2011
El jeque Osama permanecerá en la mente de la gente mucho tiempo después de que el presidente Obama sea olvidado. Ambos sumamente violentos, matando a civiles en masse, retóricamente dotados, inteligentes, atractivos, guapos. Pero uno está del lado de la historia, luchando, aunque equivocadamente, por los injustamente reprimidos, y el otro por los ilícitos represores, por un imperio moribundo, en contra de la historia. Sic transit.
→ read full articlePress Release-UN High Commission for Human Rights: Palestinian Nakba
Richard Falk, UN Special Rapporteur for the Palestinian Territories – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 May 2011
On May 15 2011 the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, Mr. Richard Falk, marks the 63rd anniversary of the Nakba, the catastrophic beginning of the Palestinian tragedy of dispossession and occupation, with the following statement.
→ read full articleWhat Happened to the Western Left?
Johan Galtung, 16 May 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 May 2011
The Western right wing is today not challenged by the Western left, but by the subtlety of Chinese capi-communism and yin-yang, far beyond Western thought, right or left. And by islamist terrorism, countered by right wing hard christianist and judeaist state terrorism. The Left fails to understand the former, rejects the latter and is unable to be enriched by the best in the buddhist, muslim, Japanese and Chinese models.
→ read full articleForty-Eight Women Raped Every Hour in Congo, Study Finds
Jo Adetunji – The Guardian,
16 May 2011
Research shows 12% of the country’s women have been raped at least once, and the problem is not confined to conflict areas.
→ read full articlePeace Studies – For Children Too
Letter of Peace Addressed to the UN, Foundation – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2011
Galtung’s assertions lead me to think that maybe we should not only bring peace to universities as a subject but also to schools. Things would be much better if someone explained to children that peace is a valuable asset, that we must care for it, that we can only achieve it together, that we must avoid imposing the will of the all-powerful minority over the majority. If generations had a conceptualization of peace integrated in life and society, it is likely that future citizens would see the world through different eyes, understand differences, appreciate diversity and love peace.
→ read full articleThe Non-Nation – A Short Story of Racism
Javed Iqbal – The Gandhi Foundation,
9 May 2011
What becomes only too evident, is that we have a social apartheid, where we have an invisible, un-written set of value-judgements upon an entire class of people who live out of sight and out of mind, and we’re aping the West who’ve colonized, butchered, enslaved, and murdered indigenous societies for centuries, and we are too far from evolving into a democracy they have never been, and could possibly never be – one that is egalitarian, just and equal, impassioned yet restrained, and where the words ‘development’ would belong to the people.
→ read full articleOsama and Obama
Johan Galtung,
9 May 2011
An educated guess: Sheikh Osama will live on in the minds of people long after President Obama has been forgotten. Both extremely violent, killing civilians en masse, rhetorically gifted, intelligent, attractive, handsome. But one is on the side of history, fighting, however wrongly, for the wrongfully suppressed, and the other for the wrongful suppressors, for a dying empire, against history. Sic transit.
→ read full articleHow Will the Empire End?
Anthony Gregory – The Future of Freedom Foundation,
2 May 2011
Dismantling the Empire: America’s Last Best Hope, by Chalmers Johnson (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2010); 212 pages.The empire will end – but how? With a bang, a whimper, a thud? Will it be peaceful, as with the Soviet Union? The people of the British Isles chose democracy over imperialism. “It is hard to imagine any sector of the American economy more driven by ideology, delusion, and propaganda than the armed services.” But “the estimated trillion dollars we spend each year on the military and its weaponry is simply unsustainable.”
→ read full articleA Mother’s Call for the Re-awakening
Nirmanusan Balasundaram - GroundViews,
2 May 2011
Mrs. B. Thilagamani began her nonviolent resistant activism when she was 18 years old and played a key role during the 1961 Satyagraha Campaign. During that campaign, Sri Lankan Armed Forces (SLAF) brutally retaliated against the nonviolent protesters. In the SLAF terror campaign of 18 April 1961 Thilagamani was sprayed with tear gas and her sari was partly burnt. Today, 18 April 2011, marks her 50 symbolic years in nonviolent activism.
→ read full articlePanamanian Corruption Concealed Amidst Free Trade Negotiations
Eric Jackson, Panama News - Council on Hemispheric Affairs-COHA,
2 May 2011
Obama welcomes Panamanian President Ricardo Martinelli in the midst of major scandal and corruption in Panama. Once again, Obama falls short of his commitments to Latin America as he collaborates with Martinelli to negotiate a flawed trade agreement. It’s not possible to have a reliable anti-drug ally in a Panamanian government that is in bed with the mob.
→ read full articleEmerging Powers – And Retiring Powers
Johan Galtung,
2 May 2011
States and nations come and go, like we all do. Childhood countries are fumbling to define their role (Africa?); puberty countries have uprisings against ruling and aging countries (Arabs? Muslims?); then there are adult, emerging countries, and tired, retiring countries. Such is life. In that home for the elderly there is even a psychiatric ward for the mentally disordered who think they are exceptional, anointed by God as chosen.
→ read full articleIslamism, Christianism, Judeaism
Johan Galtung, 25 Apr 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2011
Right now the ultimate christian mega-empire fights muslim communities with mega-weapons, drones, cruise and other missiles, fighter-bombers, high on cowardice–protected, few casualties–low on accuracy; the muslims with IEDs at $10 a piece, high on courage and devotion up to suicide, high on accuracy. US empire christianism is fighting not only for the economic-political-military-cultural empire, but also for God’s rule on earth via USA, a country under God, invoking his support. And at the root of it all is Cana’an, Zion, Israel; one land for all the chosen ones, bent on defending itself by all means, nuclear included.
→ read full articleMeritocracy: A Myth?
Maung Zarni – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2011
If you are anti-imperialist, ‘Third Worldist’ type – like I unapologetically am – it may warm your heart to know that historically Oxford produced the highest number of folks who gave the rest of the world ‘the British Empire’, which among other things grew opium in India for export to China – as a brilliant economic policy to address the Raj’s trade deficit. (Cambridge was the runner up). Often our own Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is talked about as ‘Oxford-educated’ as if her Oxford education turned her into who she is and what she is made of. As a matter of fact, it was/is her (self-acknowledged) awareness of her parents’ exemplary lives as citizens that was/is her source of inspiration.
→ read full article(Finnish) Galtung: Yhdysvallat valmisteli Libyan sotaa pitkään
Johan Galtung - Kansan Uutiset,
25 Apr 2011
Rauhantutkimuksen veteraani Johan Galtung kuvaa Libya-operaation raadollisuutta ja luotaa tulevaa.
→ read full articleUK: The Endgames of Our Empire Never Quite Finished – Just Look At Bahrain
Madeleine Bunting – The Guardian,
25 Apr 2011
It has all the ingredients of a John le Carré novel. For decades there are allegations of terrible abuse during the Mau Mau rebellion; historians are baffled by missing documentation. A court case finally prompts the Foreign Office to discover hundreds of boxes of previously hidden papers stored in a house, Hanslope Park, in Buckinghamshire. They reveal not just the brutality – which historians had already unearthed – but official recognition of the illegal violence and dogged determination to cover it up.
→ read full articleIn U.S. Prisons, Inmates Sold Into Sex Slavery
Claudia Núñez – New America Media,
18 Apr 2011
In prisons across the country, gangs are selling their fellow inmates into sex trafficking in order to increase their power and profits. Ex-convict Scott Howard, a survivor of the prison sex trade, described being smuggled from prison to prison over a two-year period. His “owners” — members of a white supremacist gang — sold him to a group of Norteño gang members, who forced Howard to prostitute himself in exchange for $7 to $20 per sexual encounter, an abuse that was repeated over the course of many years.
→ read full articleTime to Close the Nuclear Labs – The Atomic Breeding Grounds
Karl Grossman - CounterPunch,
18 Apr 2011
“Sadly,” said the Global Network, “Japan is now the victim of three gargantuan nuclear disasters: Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Fukushima,” said the Global Network. “Unless the nuclear juggernaut is stopped, we all live in Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Fukushima.”
→ read full article(Portuguese) Mumia Abu-Jamal: Do Corredor da Morte ao Mundo
Glória Muñoz Ramírez – Brasil de Fato,
18 Apr 2011
Durante um ano tentamos uma entrevista com Mumia, um dos presos políticos mais conhecidos do mundo. Enviamos cartas e pedidos através de todos os contatos possíveis que tivemos à mão, entre eles os membros do coletivo Amigos de Mumia México, os quais se ofereceram amavelmente para nos apoiar com uma gestão que tinha como destino o corredor da morte da prisão de Waynesburg, Pensilvania, onde Mumia permanece preso há 29 anos. Até que, certo dia, deslizou por baixo da porta um envelope com o nome de M. A. Jamal como remetente.
→ read full articleMena Revolution and Counter-Revolution
Johan Galtung, 18 Apr 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Apr 2011
Africa. The key to the whole exercise: in 1956 still mainly owned by Anglo-France, Libya becoming an Italian colony in 1911; posing threats of union, independence and ties to China. NATO wants to control it through AFRICOM and EUCOM–three different words for Pentagon–and this is where Libya enters; rejecting AFRICOM with Sudan, Eritrea, Zimbabwe and Cote d’Ivoire (and Sahraoui). No US bases–hence countries to be subdued. The Libya action may put Africa on fire.
→ read full articleThe Intellectual Crisis of Reporting On Burma by the International Crisis Group
Maung Zarni – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Apr 2011
When European Union policymakers will meet to review the EU Common Policy on Burma, on 12 April, they will be wise to discard the International Crisis Group’s (ICG) recent call for the unconditional embrace of the country’s military dictatorship… The ICG analysts seem to have chosen only evidence that agrees with a pro-trade, pro-aid policy stance, while critically lacking both conceptual and historical understanding of how dictatorships change.
→ read full article(Portuguese) Cúpula do BRICS na China Discute Rumos da Governança Mundial
Secr. de Comunicação Social da Presidencia da República do Brasil – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Apr 2011
A Reforma da Organização das Nações Unidas (ONU) e os rumos da governança global com eixo em um reordenamento multipolar mais equilibrado são alguns dos principais assuntos a serem tratados pelo Brasil na Cúpula de chefes de Estado dos Brics. O encontro será realizado em 14 de abril, na Ilha de Sanya, na China, e marcará a entrada da África do Sul como um dos membros do mecanismo internacional.
→ read full articleThe Civil Crime 1861-65
Johan Galtung, 11 Apr 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Apr 2011
“Causes of war” is an academic pursuit for the PhD hungry; “causes of peace” is the serious challenge. How could this crime against humanity [American Civil War] have been avoided, what would conflict solution, even peace, have looked like?.. ‘Welcome to America, home to 5% of the world’s people & 25% of the world’s prisoners,’ says the NAACP. Mainly Blacks. Rented out as labor from privatized prisons on the stock exchange, deploring lower crime rates, bribing judges for longer sentences. Jim Crow II, South and North. USA, wake up, before the republic becomes a victim of its own absurdity.
→ read full articleA Genuine Tragedy Unfolds: Bahrain and Saudi Arabia’s Rulers Goose-Step to the Brink of the Abyss
Peter Lee - Counterpunch,
11 Apr 2011
While we are diverted by the opera-bouffe spectacle of the civil war in Libya’s desert, a genuine tragedy—and potential geopolitical trainwreck—is unfolding in Bahrain.
→ read full articleThe Empire Hits Back
Johan Galtung - TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Apr 2011
Then rather treat Gadhafi the way they handled Milosevic: if you do not give in to our demands Beograd–read Tripoli–will be flattened by carpet bombing. The Finn who conveyed that message got a Nobel Peace Prize, maybe he could be called upon again?
→ read full articleHumane Meat? No Such Thing
Sunaura Taylor – Yes! Magazine,
4 Apr 2011
Should we eat animals? My disability gives me a unique view on the oxymoron “humane meat.”
→ read full articleJoint Statement on the Japanese Nuclear Disaster
The Right Livelihood Award & World Future Council – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Apr 2011
Hamburg, Stockholm, 29 March 2011. In a joint statement 50 Laureates of the Right Livelihood Award and members of the World Future Council demand a global nuclear phase out.
→ read full articlePartners in Victory! Flags for Peace!!
COVA-Confederation of Voluntary Associations – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 Mar 2011
India and Pakistan will play the semifinal of the World Cup on 30th March 2011. That the match can be played in Mohali, India is a gift of the peace process that was started in 2004.
→ read full articleTsunami and Nuke Disaster: How Human Arrogance Intensifies Suffering
Arun Gupta – AlterNet,
28 Mar 2011
How a society is impacted depends on how it is organized. The February 2010 earthquake in Chile, which claimed less than 600 lives, was about 500 times more powerful than Haiti’s 7.0 magnitude convulsion that killed more than 222,000 people. Japan’s quake at magnitude 9.0 was even more powerful than Chile’s, but relatively few people appear to have perished from the tremor itself because of Japan’s famed emergency preparedness. It was the tsunami that killed thousands and the apocalyptic meltdowns that may claim many more lives still.
→ read full article(Galego) Declaracion Institucional do Seminario Galego de Educacion para a Paz en Relación co Ataque Militar a Libia
Fundacion Cultura de Paz – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 Mar 2011
O Seminario Galego de Educación para a Paz apoiará todas as mobilizacións pacíficas e nonviolentas convocadas para manifestar a oposición á intervención militar en Libia e convocará á Coordinadora Galega pola Paz co fin de acordar accións unitarias nesta dirección.
→ read full articleLibya: The War Is On
Johan Galtung, 28 Mar 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 Mar 2011
As someone on National Public Radio quipped, “President Obama has fired more cruise missiles than all other Nobel Peace Prize winners combined”, and they have hit all kinds of targets: flying, driving, walking, being. What is next?
→ read full articleTwo Human Made Disasters: Japan and Libya
Johan Galtung, 21 Mar 2011 - TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Mar 2011
(Japan) We pray, we hope: no Chernobyl 1986. Stop! this is enough. We know enough to end all nuclear plants. There are alternatives. (Libya) BRIC + Germany are now called upon. Abstention is not good enough. Be on the side of history, and that means: be on the side of the Arab liberation from Western European-US-Israeli dominance, and an economy causing ever more inequality-misery, and autocracy. The Abstaining Five have experience in fighting such pathologies. BRIC+G, A5: The ball is in your court. Play it well.
→ read full articleThe Arab World: A Discourse about Discourses
Johan Galtung,
14 Mar 2011
Mainstream discourse is buoyed by interests and the usual anomalies of the media. The focus is on events, not permanents, no sense of history-geography, and a philosophy of cause-effect, not of dialectics inside complex systems. No dismantling empires or coming to terms with islam, but lousy one-country-at-the-time politics. And USA not on the side of history, but out of touch.
→ read full article