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.

THE WEST AND ISLAM

The scourge of global terrorism is calling into question what remains of the world order, writes Mario Soares, ex-president and ex-prime minister of Portugal. In this article, Soares writes that because of its unpredictability, no one knows when or where it will strike next. The fight against terrorism is therefore a moral and ethical imperative of the first order and must not be neglected by responsible governments. The fight against terrorism must not be seen as a \'\'war\'\' --and certainly not a \'\'preventive war-- between the West and Islam. Because the simplification of the concepts of West and Islam is reductive, dangerous, and ultimately false to the extent that it fails to take into account the complexity of the values they represent, it induces us to commit gross errors (many have already occurred) and would gradually drag us unwittingly into a religious war, which would be a colossal setback for civilization and the worst possible outcome.

GLOBAL FEAR

Never before in human history has fear been so concrete and endemic, affecting so many people in so many places at once, writes Leonardo Padura Fuentes, a Cuban journalist and writer whose novels have been translated into a dozen languages. In this article, the author writes that violence, as an expression of social, political, and even personal relations, has developed into the habitual response of not only individuals but also social groups and nations, with the result that fear extends into every level of society. There are types of fear that are stoked and manipulated by the powerful: fear of change, of difference, in people as well, like immigrants, fear of that which diverges from the interests or dominion of power. It is clear that not all violence is irrational and gratuitous but almost always has economic, social, or political roots related to marginalisation, poverty, or, at the other extreme, the arrogance of the powerful. Our lives today are fenced in by terrorism and antiterrorism, preventive wars, cold wars. There are no safe places left, there is no margin for innocent attitudes; almost no one can escape from fear, starting with the most powerful, who are in need of more and more bodyguards.

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.

SAVE THE AMAZON, SAVE THE EARTH

Brazil today is being pulled between the need for economic growth and the need to preserve its natural resources, which is especially critical with regard to the Amazon, writes Leonardo Boff, a Brazilian theologian and writer. In this article, Boff writes that the Amazon contains the majority of the world\'s rain forests, fresh water reserves, and the richest trove of biodiversity. The ecological future of the earth and life upon it depends largely on how the Amazon is treated. When he took office in 2003, President Lula named as minister of the environment Marina da Silva, a former rubber tapper and collaborator of Chico Mendes, martyr to the preservation of the Amazon. Da Silva walked into a grim situation. In the 2000/2001 period, the area deforested was 18,165 square kilometres, increasing to 23,143 the following year. To address this situation the government approved in 2004 the Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Amazon Deforestation, which affects the action of 13 ministries. The results have been positive. In 2004/2005, the rate of deforestation was reduced by 31 percent, and even better results are expected for 2006. The Lula government is generating awareness of the strategic importance of the Amazon for Brazil and for the world. This is happening in a muddle of contradictions left from a past of neglect, but the course is clear. If it can be maintained, this patrimony can be saved for humanity.

PARTNERSHIP, NOT DOMINANCE: VOICE OF ANOTHER AMERICA

It is time that US foreign policy be based on the principles upon which the US claims it was founded: democracy, equality, fairness, and the rule of law, not the rule of men, write Johan Galtung, professor of peace studies and founder and co- director of TRANSCEND: A Network for Peace and Development (www.transcend.org), and Marilyn Langlois, chair of TRANSCEND-USA. In this article, the authors write that the basic principle should be equality, We should ask ourselves whether we would want other countries to do to us what we do to them. This would rule out military occupation, unequal trade-- exchanging processed goods for raw materials-- and any form of dominance, threats, or bullying. It would include all measures that protect the four basic human needs for survival, economic well-being, freedom, and identity US policy goals for Iraq should include: acknowledging that the US role in the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq, resulting in suffering and destruction; abiding by the expressed wishes of the Iraqi people to remove the US military presence; asking Iraqis at all levels of society what they want the US to do to support their own efforts to rebuild their country; engaging in equitable trade and support constructive dialogue and cooperation among Iraq and its neighbours

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN: AN END IN SIGHT

Violence against women during conflict has become an international scandal, writes Noeleen Heyzer, Executive Director of the United Nations Fund for Women (UNIFEM), on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, November 25. In this article, the author writes that violence against women is not limited to conflict and post-conflict situations; it is a daily reality for millions of women, in all ranks of life, in every country in the world. This violence, because it is so ordinary, does not provoke the same response--either at the international, the national or the local level. To make matters worse, in many cases, women no longer trust the courts and police to help deal with this violence because their experience with legal and law enforcement institutions has shown them that the gender bias and indifference which gives rise to such violence simply runs too deep. What women have learned in almost two decades of work to end violence against women is that change is possible. It requires engaging men in transforming power relationships and working at multiple levels and across sectors to address the social and economic causes of gender violence and the links between violence, poverty, and conflict.

PROMISES ARE NO SUBSTITUTE FOR FOOD

Persistent hunger in countries like Niger reflects the failure of the international community to understand the root causes of hunger, write Anuradha Mittal, Executive Director of the Oakland Institute, and Frederic Mousseau, a food security consultant who works with international humanitarian agencies. In this article, the authors argue that the delayed response in providing aid and the insistence of donor countries like the US on providing in-kind food aid do little to strengthen national economies and tackle hunger. The dumping of cheap subsidised food aid only benefits large agribusinesses while destroying markets and livelihoods of small farmers in recipient countries. Development policies that promote economic liberalisation and encourage specialisation, commercialisation of agriculture, and withdrawal of the state from regulating the market, are eroding ability of nations to feed their populations. Niger\'s experience shows that relying on the market to solve food shortages leaves the poorest people hungrier and drives small farmers into further poverty while large food traders gain monopoly power. The fight against hunger needs to shift away from the free-market ideology. No industrialised country has been capable of developing its agriculture without protective barriers, yet the poorest farmers and consumers in the developing world have been deprived of such protection. It is time to implement an unconditional and non-paternalistic \'\'Marshall Plan for Africa\'\', including 100 percent debt relief and a boost in Western assistance.

MAKING TRADE HELP DEVELOPMENT

The link between export growth and poverty reduction is not automatic, writes Benjamin W. Mkapa, former President of Tanzania (1995-2005) and President of the South Center, an Inter-Governmental Organization based in Geneva, Switzerland. In this analysis, Mkapa writes that making international trade a more effective mechanism of poverty reduction for poor countries requires a development approach with three pillars: better national development strategies, improvements in the international trade regime, and increased and effective international financial and technical assistance for developing production and trade capacities. For the developing countries, the potential of Doha has turned into a broken dream and an unkept promise. Once again, the world has allowed the worst impulse of humanity --to take as much as possible while giving as little as possible-- to triumph over the common sense of the wealth that comes from giving. Once again, our generation of leadership has allowed another opportunity to slip through our fingers. How much longer do we have to suffer civil strife and violence before accepting the reality that at the end of the day, peace can only be sustained when we allow all to share in the wealth that is being created?

COMMUNICATIONS FOR DEVELOPMENT: PLANTING THE SEEDS OF KNOWLEDGE

We have always said, \"Give people fish and they will eat. Teach them how to fish and they will always eat.\" Today, we also say, \"Help people to communicate and you will change their lives\", writes Jacques Diouf, Director-General of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Between October 25-27, 500 delegates from across the world met in Rome at the First World Congress on Communication for Development, organized by the World Bank, FAO and the Communication Initiative, and hosted by the Government of Italy to examine how to share knowledge and information through social dialogue. This is underlined by the participation of many eminent policy and decision-makers, scholars, not to mention communications professionals. One of the most tangible contributions of the United Nations family of organizations, of which we are part, has been to help build the infrastructure for social dialogue within and between all the countries of the world. This has been a good investment, it turns out, because social science now tells us that communication lies at the heart of sustainable development. We are not talking about simply governments talking to citizens, an important responsibility though that is, but a horizontal, two-way process that allows governments to listen to people. A dialogue, not a monologue. It implies all participants in society having a voice, not just the powerful. In the past ten years, an entirely new economy worth over two trillion dollars in terms of goods and services has materialized. Information and communications technologies or ICTs have helped a number of emerging nations achieve phenomenal economic growth rates. But the pace at which the new frontiers are advancing also risks widening the gap between those who have access to the new communications technologies and the one billion of the world\'s population who don\'t. And by extension the danger is to further widen the rich-poor divide.

BRAZIL: THE MAIN ISSUES OF THE ELECTION

Beyond the usual acrobatics of political debate, certain basic issues have been introduced into Brazil\'s current general election campaign. One of these is the size of the budget, where we see a clear distinction between the liberal platform of centre-right opposition candidate Geraldo Alckmin, current governor of Sao Paulo, who supports shrinking government and reining in public spending, and the current president\'s position of better spending without a commitment to its reduction, writes Emir Sader, a philosopher and co-ordinator of the Public Policy Laboratory of the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro, executive secretary of the Latin American Council on Social Sciences. In this article for IPS, Sader writes that another fundamental issue is Lula\'s making a top priority of regional integration policy, whereas Alckmin focuses on the FTAA and free-trade treaties, above all with the US. But Alckmin, who began his campaign promising a \'\'management shake-up\'\' if he came to power with sharp cuts in public spending, inspired by the privatisation process he began in Sao Paulo, then agreed to sign a document committing himself to do no more privatisations, a direct contradiction of the repeated declarations of his primary economic advisors, backed by ex-President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, that he would go ahead with the privatisation of the state oil giant Petrobras. What changed his mind? The evidence that all of the successes of the Lula government are tied to policies and programmes that strengthen the government\'s presence in the public sphere, like social welfare, health, and culture policies, among others.

GATES HUNGER PLAN IN AFRICA IS WRONG APPROACH

The Gates-Rockefeller initiative to bring a \'new\' Green Revolution to Africa ignores the lessons of the failures of the first Green Revolution, which caused worse hunger and environmental degradation, writes Peter Rosset, author of World Hunger: Twelve Myths, Food is Different, and A New Green Revolution for Africa? (forthcoming), and Visiting Scholar in Environmental Science, Policy & Management at the University of California at Berkeley. In this article, Rosset writes that free-trade agreements have made it easier for private traders to import subsidised food from the US and the EU than to negotiate with local farmers, driving local farm prices below the cost of production and farmers into urban slums in search of low wage jobs. African farmers could easily produce far more food than they do at present but don\'t because they cannot get credit to cover production costs, obtain fair prices that would give them a minimum profit margin, or find buyers. Under such circumstances, what difference could a new \'\'technology package\'\' make? They still could neither afford the inputs, sell what they grow, nor make a living as farmers. Not to mention the severe environmental and human health risks of genetic engineering technology.

HAS THE EU REACHED ITS LIMIT?

In the wake of the announcement that Rumania and Bulgaria will be admitted into the European Union, the new anti-enlargement code words --\'\'indigestion\'\' and \'\'capacity of absorption\'\'-- are echoing across Europe, writes Joaquin Roy, Jean Monnet professor and Director of the European Centre at the University of Miami, and currently Visiting Professor at the University of Barcelona. In this analysis, Roy writes that the true mandate for this enlargement is not a recent decision, nor the Nice Treaty of 2003, but rather the offer made on May 9, 1950 by French foreign minister Robert Schuman, drafted by his associate Jean Monnet. It proposed \'\'that Franco-German production of coal and steel as a whole be placed under a common High Authority\'\'. But, immediately after, it adds that this entity should be placed \'\'within the framework of an organisation\'\', and finally, and most important, that the latter should be \'\'open to the participation of the other countries of Europe.\'\' That is the original \'\'contract\'\': the EU at its birth was the property of all European countries that comply with the essential conditions of \'\'membership\'\'. As for the voices that today claim that \'\'indigestion\'\' was caused by enlargement of 2004 and will be made worse by future additions, it\'s simply too late.

DEATH PENALTY: A FAILURE OF JUSTICE

A man is in court on trial for murder. He does not understand the language in which he is being tried. He has no defence lawyer. Because he does not know what is being said, he is unaware that he has been sentenced to death, writes Piers Bannister, a researcher on the death penalty at Amnesty International Secretariat. Some time goes by in prison. He speaks to his brother by phone and tells him that everything is all right and he is doing fine. A few hours later, he is led from his cell, taken to a public square and beheaded. This is not a fictional story, it happened to a Somalian man in Saudi Arabia in 2005. It is yet another example of the unacceptable use of the death penalty. In the few countries that continue to execute people, the death penalty is arbitrary; used disproportionately against ethnic minorities or other disadvantaged sections of society. It is administered after unfair trials, inflicted upon the innocent, the mentally ill and child-offenders. In short, the manner in which the death penalty is deployed is a failure of justice.

WHAT HOPE FOR GLOBAL ACTION ON MIGRATION?

Governments are beginning to acknowledge the urgent need for international policies that address the root causes of migration, like poverty and the demand for migrant labour, writes Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and currently President of Realising Rights: The Ethical Globalisation Initiative. In this analysis, Robinson writes that protecting migrants\' rights is central to any effective migration management. One important way to ensure that human rights issues are firmly on the agenda is to involve civil society and migrants themselves. Robinson observes that migrants with opportunities for decent and legal work contribute more to development than those who are exploited, and that policies which promote human rights like legalisation of status and access to health and housing build the capacity of diaspora communities and help their integration, even while maintaining close ties to their countries of origin.

US CUBA POLICY CONFUSED, AS USUAL

On September 15, at the annual Miami Herald Americas conference, US Secretary of Commerce, Cuban-American Carlos Gutierrez, sent up a trial balloon for a referendum for the Cuban people on whether to keep the current government led by Raul Castro, writes Joaquin Roy is Jean Monnet Professor and Director of the European Union Centre at the University of Miami. In this article, Roy writes that Gutierrez\'s idea is interesting because, it satisfies the requirement of making the Bush administration look tough on Cuba, is acceptable for domestic consumption in Florida, but it also implies that the US would accept a government with Raul Castro if the vote went his way. It is important to point out, however, that this scenario would violate Title II of the Helms-Burton Act, which establishes the conditions for normalising relations with Cuba. Lifting the embargo would be barred as long as either of the Castro brothers remained in the government. But most parties agree that Helms-Burton is a nuisance, and many today regret endorsing it in the tragic aftermath of the criminal downing of the Brothers to the Rescue planes in 1996. In conclusion, it might be wise to do follow the suggestion of John Kavulich, head of the US-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, an organisation of US companies trying to do business with Cuba: in the event of Castro\'s death, say nothing.