NEPAL: WAR OVER BUT PEACE NOT YET AT HAND

If all goes well, in the next few weeks Nepal\'s Maoist insurgents will join the government of Prime Minister GP Koirala, writes Kunda Dixit, editor and publisher of the Nepali Times newspaper in Kathmandu. In this analysis, Dixit writes that with the restoration of democracy, it was as if the lid came off and all pent-up grievances and demands of groups that had been marginalised or excluded from decision-making wanted their say. The latest complication is an eruption of demands for fair representation and self-rule from many of Nepal\'s 103 ethnic and caste groups. Despite the peace process, Nepal is in ferment. There are strikes, shutdowns, and highways blockades every day by various groups. The unrest has caused a crippling shortage of fuel. The government has held several rounds of negotiations with representatives of these groups, but has not been able to stem the agitation. As the first anniversary of the victory of People Power approaches in Nepal, there is no doubt that a compromise has to be reached and quickly before another fire ignites from the embers of ten years of war.

EUROPE MUST REACT

The world remains dangerous and exasperating in this first phase of 2007. Violence in its many manifestations continues to dominate daily life on every continent, as consumerism, even in extremely poor and disadvantaged countries, is expanding, and with it irresponsibility, the loss of values, corruption at every level, and a mode of life in the mere present, without reference to the past or a path forward into the future, writes Mario Soares, ex-president and ex-prime minister of Portugal. In this analysis Soares writes that global public opinion, the universal awareness of the threats that hang over our planet, and the international disorder that has taken root and proliferated before our very eyes, are beginning to seriously worry the people on every continent. The war in Iraq, which sharply divided the conscience of the world, finally dealt an irreversible shock to US public opinion. President Bush, now on the defensive on the domestic front, seems intent on driving forward with the war in Iraq and hopes to send more troops. Nothing has changed in his belligerent stance towards Afghanistan, Syria, Lebanon, Iran, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is to be hoped that the US Congress, responsive to American opinion, will be able to block his plans and set out a new foreign policy to restore the lost credibility of the US in the world.

SADDAM, YOUTUBE, AND THE CITIZEN SURVEILLANCE EFFECT

The flip side of the ubiquitous spy camera tracking our every movement in department stores, government offices, and corporate headquarters is \'\'inverse surveillance\'\', the private citizen\'s new-found ability to invade the privacy of public figures who have so long and with such impunity invaded their privacy, writes Mark Sommer, who hosts the internationally-syndicated radio programme, \'\'A World of Possibilities\'\' (www.aworldofpossibilities.com) and directs the Mainstream Media Project. In this analysis, Sommer writes that nearly universal access to portable audio and video recording devices can now catch a politician\'s random moment of indiscretion or conspiratorial whisper and disseminate it to a global public to the everlasting embarrassment of the subject of scrutiny. What does this radical transparency do to leadership itself when, taken out of context, almost any act can appear incriminating? On the one hand, micro cameras and recording devices in the hands of ordinary people give them the power of a citizen\'s arrest with a potential impact that extends far beyond throwing someone in jail. In that sense, it is an essential counterweight to ever greater concentration of power and surveillance in the hands of elites, a levelling device that places public figures on notice that they can never be assured that malfeasance will not be discovered and tried in the court of public exposure. It\'s a power whose potency even those wielding it may not yet fully realise.

IS THE WORLD SOCIAL FORUM ALREADY OLD NEWS

Despite the success of the seventh World Social Forum (WSF) held last month in Nairobi, media coverage of the massive event continues to wane, in sharp contrast to the prominence the event was given in its first few years, writes Mario Lubetkin, Director-General of the IPS news agency. In this article, the author writes that the decision to hold the next central forum in 2009 and leave 2008 for protest actions in various parts of the planet effectively postpones the work of building an image of a World Forum that generates serious, realistic alternative proposals in response to the major, dangerous problems that affect humanity. The silence that may fall over the forum for such a long period, despite the local and regional forums set for coming months and years, could aggravate this tendency and as a result generate even more disillusionment for many of those who are betting on the forum and its defiant motto: \'\'Another world is possible.\'\'

GREEN TRADE AND THE WTO

Sustainable development should be the cornerstone of our approach to globalisation and of the global governance architecture that we create, writes Pascal Lamy, Director-General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). In this article, Lamy writes that the Doha Round of trade negotiations contains a promise to the environment to allow for a more efficient allocation of resources including natural ones on a global scale through a continued reduction of obstacles to trade (tariffs and subsidies). But it also includes a promise to ensure greater harmony between the WTO and Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs): a promise to tear down the barriers to trade in clean technologies and services; as well as a promise to reduce the environmentally-harmful agricultural subsidies. The world must forge ahead with these negotiations as fast as it possibly can. Not because the negotiations are going to save the world\'s environment. But because they are the very modest start that the international community has agreed to make to address environmental challenges through the prism of trade. A failure of these negotiations would strengthen the hand of all those who argue that economic growth should proceed unchecked, that economic growth is supreme and need not take account of the environment. Trade, and indeed the WTO, must be made to deliver sustainable development. They are starting to.

FREE TRADE IS OVER (IF THE PEOPLE WANT IT TO BE)

The US and South Korea are working around the clock to sign the Korea-US Free Trade Agreement (KorUS FTA), which would become the second largest trade deal after NAFTA, writes Christine Ahn, a policy analyst with the Korea Policy Institute and Oakland Institute and a member of the Korean Americans for Fair Trade coalition. In this article, Ahn writes that Wall Street corporations and South Korean chaebols are salivating at the opportunity to increase their portion of 72 billion dollars in business the two countries trade annually. Normally, such a trade deal would breeze through the halls of the US Congress and the Korean National Assembly. But times have changed. The public discourse on free trade is no longer just about the ability of corporations to move their capital freely across borders. It\'s about the anger and frustration of middle and working class people who see their security dwindling to further line the pockets of white-collar business executives. That anger can then express itself during elections, ousting officials mired in the rhetoric of the last century. Free trade is over, and hopefully the social justice movements in the United States will unite with the energising movements in South Korea to stop this antiquated regime.

THE WARNED

Human beings have never been as thoroughly warned about the gravity of their actions against nature as today. Hair-raising data, apocalyptic predictions, frightening evidence follow us each day to announce that disaster is drawing closer and close, writes Leonardo Padura Fuentes, a Cuban writer and journalist whose novels have been translated into a ten languages. In this article, the author writes that never before has the thinking species had the responsibility to fight for its own survival on the planet where the miracle of life was made real. Humanity has come to a crossroads with its awareness that it is even possible to calculate how much time is left for action in this third act. Intelligence has been the hallmark of this species capable of lifting itself above the others. Today only its extraordinary capacity of thought and reason can save it, although at the rate things are going, with so few world leaders and individuals willing not only to think but to take drastic action, everything seems to indicate that the bells will ring and we will not be able to ask for whom: they ring for all of us, for our children and theirs.

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: FROM WORDS TO ACTION

Seven World Social Forums (WSF) have been enough for the dynamic of civil society to complete a cycle and initiate a stage of profound change -- in contrast to the World Economic Forum (WEF), which has been held 37 times, writes Roberto Savio, founder and president emeritus of IPS and a member of the WSF International Committee. In this analysis, Savio writes that Nairobi was the last forum in keeping with the original conception of the WSF. The entrance of more radical forces into the WSF International Council in recent years has caused a very important change of direction. As a result, next year the forum will not be an occasion for meeting and debate but rather a mobilisation. During the days the WEF will be held in Davos, local events will be staged throughout the world by participating organisations, including marches and demonstrations. Even the WSF International Council has decided to meet in Germany on the occasion of demonstrations against the G8, which will happen in Berlin in June. This is a new path, one that is closer to that of the social movements that are becoming the driving forces of Global Civil Society.

A CRUCIAL YEAR FOR THE EUROPEAN UNION

It may sound dramatic, but it may be now or never for the EU, writes Joaquin Roy, \'\'Jean Monnet\'\' professor and Director of the European Union Centre of the University of Miami. In this analysis Roy writes that this will be a decisive year for the organisation: it is now fifty years since it took its first daring step with the Rome Treaty of March 1957, which transformed the initial European Steel and Coal Community, formed in 1951, by incorporating the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community. It has now been five years since the adoption of the euro by 300 million citizens in the thirteen countries of the EU as well as a handful of mini-states that had used the currencies of member states. The euro was a success in all basic monetary operations. Although the dollar remains dominant in terms of the setting of prices and tallying debt, as an exchange currency the euro is on the verge of surpassing it. However, while these two ambitious moves proved highly successful, the warnings made simultaneously about the need for institutional reform of an organisation used to dealing with fifteen more-or-less collegial members have not been heeded. Unfortunately the Constitution was derailed halfway through the ratification process after rejection by Dutch and French voters. With the project on hold until more favourable conditions emerge, observers are now looking towards the German presidency of the EU in the current semester and the results of France\'s May elections. The energy of the former and the disposition of the new leadership in Paris will determine the future course of the EU.

THE SHIFTING POWER EQUATION

We are in the midst of a revolution in which power is moving from the centre to the periphery and vertical command and control structures are eroding, writes Klaus Schwab, founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, whose Annual Meeting in Davos will take place January 24-28. In this article, the author writes that today global trusteeship is needed more than ever since we have to confront so many global challenges simultaneously. The world has become a complex and dangerous place requiring urgent, effective mechanisms to address all the challenges in a proactive, comprehensive and systemic way. Recent events have highlighted the realities of global impotence. We are witnessing profound decay in the structures we have historically used to manage our world. We are witnessing the de-globalisation of a globalised world as the UN, the Bretton Woods organisations and many other multinational frameworks are struggling to keep up with changing global needs. This is made clear by our collective incapability to deal effectively with rogue states, with failed states, with terrorism and other events, from the collapse of the Doha trade talks to the crisis in Darfur. Existing global governance systems can no longer meet all the challenges of the 21st century in their present form, but reforms based just on prolonging the paradigms of the past will fail in our new flat world. What we need to do is connect, and reconnect, leaders from business, politics and civil society to form new coalitions to improve the state of our world and shape a new collective will.

WTO COMPROMISE ON AGRICULTURE WILL UNLOCK MAJOR TRADE BENEFITS

Many proposals have already been presented at the Doha Round Negotiations, but clearly what is on the table today is not enough to lead us to success. All parties need to make a greater contribution, starting with agriculture, writes Pascal Lamy, Director-General of the World Trade Organisation . In this article, the author writes that the US has to accept cuts in its subsidies beyond its current offer, as do the EU and the G-10. India and the G-33 countries also have to show flexibility. Indeed, if we are to reach a result, all Members have to show flexibility. No one is being asked to undertake disproportionate commitments, and certainly there is the flexibility to address for specific needs and concerns. With an additional effort we can unlock agriculture which in turn will open the last stage of talks on the other topics. This Round offers the largest cuts ever on tariffs on the industrial sector, which represents a large part of developed countries exports and holds the promise of reformed antidumping procedures to enhance transparency and predictability. For the first time ever it tackles fishery subsidies which increase capacities and contribute to the depletion of our oceans. It also goes deeper in opening telecommunications and financial, environmental, and a broad range of business services.

THE REFUGE OF REREADING

If reading a recently published book gives the taste of an encounter with the unknown, returning those one has read many times provides the slightly cowardly certainty of arriving at a safe harbour, writes Leonardo Padura Fuentes, a Cuban writer and journalist whose novels have been translated into a ten languages. In this article, the author writes that returning to these old acquaintances also cures us of the deceptions that, echoing through the market, catapult us occasionally into the embrace of books that make us lament the nights invested in their pages, when we know perfectly well the years of our lives are far too few to read everything good and essential written by our fellow humans. Perhaps the most disagreeable of these sensations occurred while I was reading the Da Vinci Code, convinced that to be able to at least criticise it I had to plough through all 600 or so pages: for years and years I have not read anything so miserably written, ill-conceived, and artistically false. The dumb provocation of the establishment devised by Brown was so innocuous and bogus that the publishing industry could swallow it happily and turn it into a sales behemoth sweeping many areas of the market while pushing to the margin, if not beyond it, that which should always be at the front: literature.

DEATH PENALTY: TOWARDS A UNIVERSAL MORATORIUM

With passage of the United Nations Moratorium on Executions likely in the current General Assembly, we are on the verge of obtaining a major victory for humanity which the Non-violent and Transnational Radical Party and Hands Off Cain have been seeking for fourteen years, writes Elisabetta Zamparutti, curator of the annual report of Hands Off Cain, \'\'The Death Penalty in the World\", and a leader of the Radical Party. In this article, the author writes that after the execution of Hussein and through the moratorium campaign, Hands Off Cain and the Radical Party have succeeded in making everyone understand, even in the Arab world and beginning with the Cain of our time, the urgency of preventing a widening cycle of violence and war, in Iraq and elsewhere, which would have disastrous consequences. It was non-violent actions that were responsible for convincing the public of the urgency a measure like the UN moratorium and so accelerated the historic process of abolitionism. The startling drama and horror of the death penalty in the world today is to be found largely in the 98 percent of the world\'s 5000 years executions that are carried in totalitarian and repressive countries. It is because of the nameless and forgotten victims of the death penalty in these countries that a universal moratorium is so very important.

//NOT FOR PUBLICATION IN AUSTRALIA, CANADA, NEW ZEALAND, CZECH EPUBLIC, IRELAND, POLAND, THE UNITED STATES, AND THE UNITED KINGDOM//: THE GREEN GOLD RUSH

The conundrum that has long obstructed progress on global warming and a broader transition from a petro-centric to a biocentric economy -- can environmental imperatives be addressed within a profit-driven economic system? -- may finally be giving way to a tidal wave of global green innovation, writes Mark Sommer, host of \'A World of Possibilities,\' an award-winning,internationally syndicated radio programme that can be heard at www.aworldofpossibilities.com. In this article, Sommer writes that November\'s flush of Democratic victories was less an endorsement of the party than a rejection of the oil-igarchy that has blocked effective action on a wide range of issues. In its wake, the pent-up demand for new products and services to serve a post-carbon economy may now begin to trigger a potent market-driven response from industry, academia, consumers, and after all others, policymakers. The greening of the global economy will likely be led not by the environmental activists whose persistence was so essential to raising initial public awareness but by some of the very corporate behemoths who were rightly criticised for their inaction and some of the very conservatives (though not of the Bush variety) who have long held that environmental goals and economic realities are innately incompatible.

WHY ARE SO MANY INNOCENTS CONVICTED?

\'The forensic experts neither had nor used methods that could link the accused to the murder.\' So stated a solid cross-section of leading Norwegian scientists in a recent plea for the reversal of a murder conviction that has troubled the conscience of Norwegian society since 1958, writes Fredrik S. Heffermehl, President of the Norwegian Peace Alliance and Vice President of the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms. In this article, the author writes that in response to several spectacular reversals of murder convictions, Norway established a new commission three years ago to review convictions, independent of the courts. Today scientists consider the evidence in the 1958 case absolutely worthless, and they reacted with disbelief and anger when the commission rejected the call for a retrial. The lack of specific, methodological training and disciplined thought in the courts is a problem, and not only in Norway. According to an article in the latest issue of Nature, courts in the Netherlands fail to understand elementary statistics. According to an international seminar on science and evidence organised by the University of Oslo last September, imprecise methods lead to a high risk of wrong sentences. When the courts, even in a rich, advanced, and democratic country like Norway, make so many mistakes, one must shudder at the situation in regimes where the rule of law and independence of the judiciary do not exist. These countries carry out 98 percent of the 5.000 executions that occur in the world every year -- an overwhelming reason why the UN General Assembly should approve the universal moratorium on capital punishment now under consideration.

DEMOCRATIC DEFICIT CENTRAL CONCERN OF GLOBAL CIVIL SOCIETY

One fact of globalisation is that many decisions that affect virtually all human beings everywhere, for many generations, are increasingly taken by a few, writes Kumi Naidoo, Secretary General of CIVICUS World Alliance for Citizen Participation. In this article Naidoo writes that countering this ever-increasing democratic deficit at both the domestic and international level is a major concern of this World Social Forum. One of the current challenges is the trend of increasing threats to civil society\'s very existence. These are closely associated with the so-called \'war on terror\' discourse and practice and take the form of legislation passed by an ever-growing number of countries to restrict the rights and activities of civil society. As civil society has grown more powerful, at both the national and global level, there is also increased questioning by governments and critics of the legitimacy, transparency, and accountability of civil society. Many efforts are underway to address this challenge.

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: ANOTHER WORLD FOR AFRICA

From January 20-25, the 7th World Social Forum will take place in Africa. For the global civil society, the resistance of the Africans, who have been subjected to atrocious violence and human rights violations and the devastation of a world system that serves the major corporations and the imperialist powers, is a source of inspiration and strength to carry forward its mission of building \'\'other worlds\'\', writes Candido Grzybowski director of the Brazilian Institute of Social and Economic Analysis (IBASE) and a member of the International Council of the World Social Forum. In this article, the author writes that in the face of the severe inequality in the process of globalisation and the logic of terror and the war that feeds it, we continue to expand and create hope. Given that Africa is being neglected by the economic system and the reigning powers, holding the Forum there is a form of radical commitment to the insurgent global civil society that shows its character and the scope of its struggle. Now in Africa, we will dismantle the prevailing vision and rhetoric about a lost and hopeless continent. We will learn from Africa\'s vibrant culture. Holding the WSF in Africa means filling ourselves with the visions, images, analyses, critiques, demands, and proposals of the social movements and the entities of African civil society.

SOUTH KOREA USED VIOLENCE AND COERCION TO EXPAND US BASES

The government of South Korea is waging alarming levels of violence and repression against its people to help the US enlarge its military presence, writes Christine Ahn, policy analyst with the Korea Policy Institute, fellow with the Oakland Institute, and a member of KAWAN, Korean Americans Against War and Neoliberalism. In this article, Ahn writes that under the Pentagon\'s 2003 Global Posture Review, the US Forces in Korea are changing their historic role of defending South Korea to having more \'strategic flexibility\' to deal with conflicts in the region while handing back responsibility to South Korea to defend itself, while using the peninsula as a launching pad. Last September 22,000 riot police marched into Daechuri to bulldoze 68 homes and the village human rights centre. This was the second demolition after the one in May when 20,000 police brutally attacked several hundred villagers who used only their bodies to prevent them from destroying their rice paddies and homes. To many Koreans the struggle in Pyongtaek has become a part of its ongoing history of invasion and occupation by foreign forces and a symbol of Korea\'s division. Many South Koreans view the US\' amplified military presence in South Korea as fuelling tensions with North Korea and an obstacle to reunification.

OUTLOOK 2006: FIVE THREATS TO GLOBAL PROSPERITY

Though the current state of the global economy is good, there are five areas of concern, writes Supachai Panitchpakdi, Secretary-General of UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development). In this article, the author writes that the first is the current impasse in the Doha Round talks, which hurts the world\'s poorest most acutely. The second concern is poverty. Globalisation and trade liberalisation have had a mixed impact. Some nations have been even further marginalised as a result, with poverty and income distribution in some cases worsening. The third area of concern is migration, which is sometimes perceived as a threat to jobs and to host societies ill equipped to absorb vast numbers of migrants. The fourth is energy security. The author calls for a well-structured, coordinated system of global economic governance that is beneficial to all countries and would help avoid potentially disastrous global imbalances and also avert distortions in international trade relations.

THE MEANING OF THE YEAR OF ELECTIONS IN LATIN AMERICA

Hugo Chavez\' re-election on December 3 concludes a year of elections in Latin America in which nine countries chose candidates reportedly left of centre and three chose candidates reportedly right of centre, writes Jennifer McCoy, Professor of Political Science at Georgia State University and Director of the Americas Programme at The Carter Centre in Atlanta, Georgia. In this article, McCoy writes that the electoral debates essentially came down to two themes: how much of a priority to put on fighting poverty, and how to define a country\'s relationship with the US and the global economy. Extremely close elections in Costa Rica and Mexico, and run-offs in Brazil, Peru, and Ecuador demonstrated that there are seriously divided countries in the region. Much of Latin America also shares deepening nationalism and an abhorrence of US unilateralism. What the new leaders across the board face is the dilemma of meeting the high expectations of frustrated citizens while navigating the real constraints of economic globalisation and weak state capacity and institutions. These constraints can draw a country together under strong leadership and well-organised interests with a national vision, or they can destabilise a country that is factionalised and lacks a sense of shared national identity and purpose. The post-election year of 2007 will determine which direction each will go.

ARGENTINA, BURMA, AND INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY

Because Argentina is currently a member of the UN Security Council and has experienced the trauma caused by a military dictatorship, there is hope that it will back an immediate and binding Security Council resolution on Burma, writes Kerry Kennedy, author of \"Speak Truth to Power\" and founder of the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Centre for Human Rights. In this article, Kennedy writes that last year during a trip to the Navy Mechanics School in Buenos Aires, which was a prison and centre for torture during the military dictatorship, she heard government officials, survivors, and mothers of the disappeared testify how their capacity to survive often depended on their faith that they were not alone, that people on the outside cared. The author, daughter of Robert F. Kennedy, argues that just as current Argentinean leaders testified that international solidarity was crucial to their fight against the military regime, so the support of Argentina and the international community is crucial now to Aung San Suu Kyi and the people of Burma. For the first time the Security Council is considering a resolution to charge Burma\'s military dictatorship with grave human rights violations since it took power in 1990. The poem by Ariel Dorfman, renowned Chilean author and playwright who was born in Argentina, which follows this article, can be published together or separately.