INTERVIEW WITH MORDECHAI VANUNU: ‘A STRANGE CONCEPT OF JUSTICE’

Three months after his release after 18 years in prison in Israel, Mordechai Vanunu, Israel\'s nuclear whistleblower, was back in his country\'s judicial system, this time to demand his full freedom: the lifting of restrictions imposed on him by Israeli authorities barring him from talking to foreigners, particularly journalists, and from leaving the country. Under international law Israel is obliged to restore to Vanunu his full rights as a normal citizen after completion of his sentence. The only exception to this rule is for reasons of \'\'national security\'\'. The judges in the first short session before the Court rightly pointed out that the question of secrets was a key factor in the case. And indeed the nuclear debate has been picking up in Israel in the months around Vanunu\'s release. This whistleblower thinks it is high time that the State thank him instead of trying to punish him forever.

THE NEXT STEP TOWARDS A NUCLEAR FREE WORLD

Since the discovery of Iraq\'s clandestine nuclear weapons programme in the early 1990s, the IAEA has sought creative methods to strengthen the nuclear safeguards regime; these methods have in many ways proved successful, writes Mohamed ElBaradei, Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). In this analysis, the author writes that \"our recent experiences in Iraq, Iran, and Libya have confirmed how effective IAEA verification can be, even under difficult conditions, provided that we are given adequate authority, aided by all available information, backed by a credible compliance mechanism, and supported by international consensus\". A key aspect of IAEA authority is the so-called \'\'additional protocol\'\', the supplement to a safeguards agreement with the IAEA that gives it broader rights of access to information and inspection sites. For the regime to be credible, the additional protocol should be accepted as the verification standard, but only 56 of the 184 non-nuclear-weapon states party to the NPT have ratified the protocol. Developing countries can play their part to enhance the credibility of the NPT regime and solidify their position on the \'\'moral high ground\'\' by bringing this additional protocol into force.

GLOBAL COMPACT SHOULD SPIN OFF FROM UN

The UN Global Compact brought together over 400 leaders of corporations, labour unions, and civil society at its June 24th Summit, writes Hazel Henderson, author of numerous books on global sustainability and financial reform and is founder and president of Ethical Marketplace, a global media company. In this article, Henderson writes that what is now a global network of 1,500 signatory companies began in 2000 as a challenge in a speech by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to corporate leaders to adopt nine principles of good corporate citizenship -- regarding human rights, labour standards, and the environment. The Compact, initially a system of voluntary \'\'engagement\'\' with little monitoring or accountability, became a mutual peer-pressure association at the Summit. However, civil society organisations led by the Earth Rights Foundation asserted that the Global Compact is a distraction from the real task of the UN and governments, which is to establish effective inter-governmental frameworks for corporate accountability. They urge that the Compact be disbanded. The wisest course would be to spin off the Compact as an independent organisation, Henderson concludes.

CONFESSIONS OF THE TORTURER

The information obtained through torture is not credible, or barely so, for the simple reason that pain transforms anyone into an author of fiction; the powers that use torture, on the other hand, reveal their true identity through this grim practice: in the chambers of torment, the commanders take off their masks, writes Eduardo Galeano, Uruguayan writer and author of \'\'The Open Veins of Latin America\'\' and \'\'Memories of Fire\'\'. In this analysis, Galeano writes that the occupying forces preach democracy and freedom but practice crime and torture. The rest is pure theatre: the ceremonies, proclamations, speeches, promises, the transfer of sovereignty. Torture generates information that is of minimal usefulness and questionable veracity. Yet it has been and continues to be used because it is efficient in punishing heresy, causing humiliation, and sowing fear. The monks of the Inquisition knew this very well, and so does the top military brass of today\'s imperial adventures. Power does not use torture to protect the population but to terrorize it. Will it be as efficient as power thinks it is? Galeano asks.

WTO: DEVELOPMENT AT STAKE

The WTO talks underway in Geneva, aimed at reviving negotiations on lowering global trade barriers, are yet another demonstration of the crisis of inequity and hypocrisy that has afflicted the organisation from the very beginning, writes Anuradha Mittal, founder and director of the Oakland Institute, a non-partisan research, analysis, and advocacy group. In this article, the author writes that the draft agreement set before the 147 members on July 16 openly discriminates against developing nations by adopting a non-committal approach to the Special and Differential treatment needs, sensitive products, and special safe guard mechanisms, all of which it leaves to a \'\'post- framework stage\'\'. At the same time, the draft overlooks African countries\' demands that the Cotton Initiative be treated on a stand-alone, fast-track basis, instead adopting the US demand to consider this issue under the broader agriculture negotiations. The truth is that in the draft July package, the organisation is acting like a Robin Hood in reverse: trying to rob the world\'s poor to enrich American and European corporations. The WTO will remain deadlocked as long as it continues to fail the development needs of the poor.

WTO DOHA ROUND AT CRUCIAL JUNCTURE

The Doha Development Agenda of the WTO is at a crucial juncture: by the end of July we need to secure a framework package for agriculture and industrial products and an accord which better defines how we address cotton subsidies and the so-called Singapore Issues (investment, competition, transparency in government procurement, and trade facilitation), writes Supachai Panitchpakdi, Director-general of the World Trade Organisation. In this article, the author writes that if governments and their constituents lose faith in the ability of the Doha Development Agenda to deliver results we will see a growing imbalance between multilateral and bilateral deal-making. This could shake the foundations of non-discrimination and transparency upon which the multilateral trading system is built. Common ground must be found, and quickly. International business and the global trade machine will certainly not wait for us to move. Discriminatory market access arrangements will become commonplace and the law of the jungle will prevail. The losers every time will be the poorer, developing countries.

A WORRYING SITUATION FOR THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLE OF SOUTH EAST ASIA.

In mid-July the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) will vote on whether to suspend for three years the Transnational Radical Party\'s (TRP) consultative status within the Council in response to a request by the Vietnamese Delegation to the UN, writes Emma Bonino deputy in the European Parliament and a leader of the Transnational Radical Party. In this article, Bonino writes that suspension would send a very unfortunate message regarding human rights in the area, particularly for the indigenous people of South East Asia. Vietnam believes that the TRP has abused its relationship with the UN by accrediting Kok Ksor, whom they allege to be a terrorist with a separatist agenda. Kok Ksor is a member of the Montagnards, the ethnic minority asylum seekers from Vietnam\'s Central Highlands, and is the President of the Montagnard Foundation Inc. (MFI), a non-profit organization registered in the US and dedicated to the preservation of Montagnard life and culture. MFI is not on any national or international list of terrorist organizations recognized by the EU, the US or the UN. Suspension the consultative status of the TRP will not only ban it from the UN system, but will also silence dozens of voices that, over the last several years, have been allowed to present their concerns before many UN bodies, starting with the Commission on Human Rights.

FROM ICELAND: TEN PROPOSALS FOR PEACE

On June 26, Iceland will hold presidential elections, with candidate Thor Magnusson running on a peace platform. If he wins, he could do a lot -- for Iceland and for the world, write Johan Galtung, professor of Peace Studies and Director of TRANSCEND: A Peace and Development Network, and Dietrich Fischer, Academic Director of the European University Centre for Peace Studies in Stadtschlaining, Austria and Co-Director of TRANSCEND. In this column, authors present ten proposals for what the president of a small country could do for peace. Today, a peace president could invite all of the governments in the Middle East to a modern \'\'Helsinki Conference on Security and Cooperation\'\' to explore the creation of a six-state Middle East Community, comprised of Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Egypt, and a fully-recognised Palestine, modelled after the European Community. Why not build on successes rather than heading for new failures with the misguided US \'\'road map\'\'? A peace president could be the first to introduce peace education in all schools with a focus on non-violent alternatives. A study of TV violence shows that damage is done less by the viewing of violent acts than by the absence of non-violent alternatives and attention to the grief and trauma of the bereaved. Iceland can also provide a model for developing countries. To its traditional economy based on agriculture and fishing it has added electronics and pharmaceuticals, bypassing heavy industry.

EURO-PARLIAMENT ELECTIONS IN EUROPE: PAY ATTENTION

This week-end\'s elections to the European Parliament may seem like yet another of those \'\'old Europe\'\' oddities --like the welfare state, long paid vacations, and constitutional monarchies-- but its importance should not be underestimated, writes Joaquin Roy is university professor \'Jean Monnet\' and director of the Centre of the European Union of the University of Miami. The European Parliament is the largest directly-elected democratic legislature in the world: with 732 members, it represents 350 million citizens from 25 countries. Yet to judge from press coverage and the projected rate of voter turnout (less than 50 percent) both foreigners and Europeans seem to share a certain scepticism about the role of institution. What the citizens who stay away from the polls apparently do not know is that their daily existence depends more and more on the decisions taken by the Euro-parliament, which passes community laws each week. More than eighty percent of European legislation originates from the EU institutional process.

PEACEFUL CO-EXISTENCE: A PROVEN IDEA FOR A TUMULTUOUS WORLD

The principle of peaceful co-existence has just turned fifty, and while the pessimists feel that it is out of fashion, the optimists believe that it is more important than ever, writes Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Secretary General of the UN from 1992-1996. On 29 April 1954, the China and India signed an Agreement on Trade and Communications between the Tibet region of China and India based on five principles: mutual respect for each other\'s territorial integrity and sovereignty; mutual non-aggression; mutual non-interference in each other\'s internal affairs; equality and mutual benefit; peaceful co-existence. In his article, the author writes that pessimists hold the five principles have lost their force because they are linked with the UN, marginalised since the end of the Cold War and the emergence of a single superpower. To apply the five principles there is no need to wait for an overhaul of the UN system, since the basic concepts are already in the Charter. They can be made more effective by taking into consideration the drastic technical changes brought about during the post-Cold War period, globalisation, the increasing gap between rich and poor countries, the multiplicity of internal wars, and the unilateralism of the lonely superpower\'s policy.

INCREASED TRADE NO PANACEA FOR DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

In the 40 years since the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) was founded, the international environment has been radically transformed by globalisation, and the problems experienced by developing countries today require innovative approaches, writes Rubens Ricupero, Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The eleventh quadrennial UNCTAD conference will be held in Sao Paulo, June 13-18. In this article for IPS, Ricupero writes that the conference will define the type of national and multilateral measures that are needed to ensure that integration into the world economy yields real development gains for developing countries. Open trade regimes and financial markets alone are not enough. The author notes that in many developing countries, conventional, market-based policies have not lived up to expectations for sustainable development and poverty reduction, arguing that trade policies should be complemented by redistributive policies, primarily through taxes, as UNCTAD proposes.

EUROPEAN UNION: THE BIGGER, THE MORE CONSERVATIVE

The profoundly conservative nature of European politics, the EU institutions, and individual member states is worrying, particularly as manifested in EU economic and social policy, writes Emma Bonino, deputy in the European Parliament and a nleader of the Transnational Radical Party. In this article, Bonino writes that current debates about the size of the EU budget are beside the point as long as almost half of these funds will go to finance the Common Agricultural Policy, which imposes a huge cost on EU consumers while ruining the hopes of hundreds of millions of farmers in developing countries. Another troubling example of conservatism was the decision by almost all of the fifteen old member countries to put off until 2011 complete freedom of movement for workers of the ten countries that just joined the EU. Then there is the continuous postponement of the initiation of serious negotiations on admitting Turkey. While the reasons for such prudence are comprehensible, the EU cannot lose this historic occasion to create a deep and stable connection between a large Islamic country and the liberal and democratic West.

COLUMN DEDICATED TO INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL DAY CELEBRATED ON JUNE 5: ONE WORLD, ONE OCEAN. AND IT IS TIME TO SAVE IT

The rich and poor worlds are linked as never before - by economics, trade, migration, and by one body of water that covers 70% of the earth\'s surface, and on which our survival depends. As there is only one World, there is also one Ocean. But the world\'s Ocean is dying, writes Ian Johnson, Vice President of the World Bank. But there is reason to hope. The 2002 Johannesburg Summit on Sustainable, called for ambitious but achievable goals such as restoring degraded fish stocks to sustainable levels by 2015. Now it is time to move forward and developed countries must lead the way. As with agriculture, rich countries must lead the way in eliminating the harmful subsidies and other protectionist policies that lead to over-fishing. These policies need to end to avoid continuing the depletion of the Ocean\'s living resources.

HOW ASEAN CAN HELP BRING DEMOCRACY TO BURMA

ASEAN made history with its recent public remarks about Burma and its military government, calling upon them to release popular national leader Suu Kyi from house arrest and to take action to settle the country\'s long-running civil and political wars, writes Jose Ramos-Horta, Nobel Peace Laureate and East Timor\'s Minister of Foreign Affairs. In this article, Ramos-Horta writes that this reflected the mounting alarm of ASEAN leaders of Burma\'s right to assume the chairmanship of the group in 2006. If there is no change, in 2006 ASEAN will be led by a military government that keeps over 1,300 political prisoners, relies on forced labour for public works, and has left over one million people internally displaced, ASEAN must encourage and expect Burma to seriously engage with its own people, especially Suu Kyi, her party, and the political leaders of the ethnic nationalities. We must encourage and expect Burma to engage with its neighbours, with ASEAN, and with the United Nations, to effect political and economic change. And we must encourage and expect the SPDC to demonstrate their leadership bona fides by rising to these challenges.

BEYOND THE SPANISH THRONE

On May 22, Prince Felipe de Borbon, heir to Spanish throne, will marry television news anchorwoman Letizia Ortiz. While the pomp and publicity of this royal event are sure to draw attention away from the crucial institutional dimensions of the monarchy, it is important to remember that it occupies a central place in the Spanish political system, writes Joaquin Roy, \'Jean Monnet\' Professor and Director of the European Union Centre of the University of Miami. The king is both the highest representative of the state to other countries and the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. It is the king who appoints the prime minister, prior to the recommendation by Congress (according to the results of elections or post-electoral arrangements), and who has the prerogative to declare war and make peace (with proper authorisation of Congress). Less fascinated with the monarchy than the British, Spaniards have less patience with it. For only a fraction of the bad behaviour of the Windsors, the Spanish monarchy would end in a few weeks. Felipe and Letizia know this very well. They will have to work every day to keep their jobs.

COCA PROHIBITION A MISERABLE FAILURE: END IT

Efforts to eradicate coca production through \'\'supply reduction\'\' and \'\'alternative development\'\' have failed miserably, writes Emma Bonino, Member of the European Parliament and founding member of the International Anti-prohibitionist League. In this analysis, Bonino writes that the situation in the Andes has become unbearable for local communities, threatening the general development of their countries while providing a source of easy and big money for all sorts of illegal groups, from the narcos to terrorist and paramilitary networks. Comprehensive alternative development projects should address the broader economic situation of farmers, who cultivate \'\'drug crops\'\' not only because of to \'\'rural poverty\'\', \'\'lack of access to markets for legal products\'\', and \'\'unsuitable soil for many other crops\'\' as the UN claims, but also because the plants are an integral part of the cultures, traditions, and religions of the indigenous peoples living in those regions. The Permanent Forum should look into the possibility of reflecting coca-related issues in its annual report, where it issues recommendations to the ECOSOC. Ending the prohibition on coca should become a priority for all those that genuinely struggle for freedom and human rights and that are working towards the establishment of a system that functions on the force of law and not the law of force, a law that does not prohibit, but facilitates, the cohabitation of peaceful peculiarities including, ultimately, indigenous issues.

CONSUMER-LED STRATEGIES RECYCLE PAPER AND SAVE ANCIENT FORESTS

Alarmed by the unrelenting destruction of the world\'s remaining old growth trees and frustrated by unresponsive and ineffectual government regulators, ancient-forest activists are turning to market-based strategies to pressure leading paper producers and retailers to shift to recycled and tree-free paper products, writes Mark Sommer, director of the Mainstream Media Project and host of award-winning syndicated radio programme, \'\'A World of Possibilities.\'\' Over the past few years, the Paper Campaign, a US-based grassroots coalition of environmental groups, has targeted the world\'s top three paper products retailers in a concerted effort to shift market signals. In November, 2002 Staples announced its commitment to rapidly phase out all wood and paper products made from endangered forests, achieve 50 percent post-consumer content within two years, and phase out all products with 100 percent virgin wood fibre. Using recycled rather than virgin wood-fibre papers is one step in the right direction, but paper can be and is being made economically from numerous other fibres besides trees. The most promising of new options is kenaf, a fast-growing, single-season crop that can reach 18 feet in several months under optimal conditions and can be manufactured by existing paper mills.

UN CONVENTION TARGETS KLEPTOCRAT RULERS

In election campaigns this year in Indonesia and the Philippines --countries that have been impoverished by the greed of successive corrupt leaders-- the presidential candidates have battled one another for the anti-corruption mantle, writes Peter Eigen, Chairman of Transparency International. In this analysis for IPS, Eigen writes that both countries are case studies in how corrupt leaders who take advantage of immense personal power and immunity from prosecution can devastate their populations by systematically plundering their wealth. The recent adoption of the United Nations Convention against Corruption is an important step towards the repatriation of money siphoned off by nefarious leaders. The first-ever UN International Anti-Corruption Day will be held on 9 December to pressure governments to ratify the Convention so that stolen assets can be returned to their rightful owners. Thirty ratifications are needed before the Convention comes into force. Citizens have a right to know what happens to the money managed by public officials in the developed and developing worlds, and to insist that donor and other government funds reach the intended recipients - the people.

MAKE IT OR BREAK IT TIME FOR LATEST WTO NEGOTIATIONS

2004 is a crucial year for the Doha negotiations of the World Trade Organisation and the multilateral trading system in general, writes Supachai Panitchpakdi, Director-General of the World Trade Organization. In this article, the author writes that since the beginning of this year, starting with the instrumental efforts by US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick, we have witnessed a number of very important initiatives and inputs to help move the process forward. I personally saw a much- needed new level of political commitment at important ministerial gatherings such as the Paris Ministerial Conference of the OECD and the Less Developed Countries (LDC) Ministerial Conference in Senegal. WTO Members are showing a remarkable sense of political urgency and realism, combined with the willingness to negotiate substance, and they are determined to reach framework agreements by July. The WTO and the multilateral system are under pressure again to deliver results. I have consistently argued that if governments and their constituents lose faith in the ability of the Doha negotiations to deliver results, we can expect to see a growing imbalance between multilateral and bilateral deal-making, widening the gap between stronger and weaker countries. The foundations upon which the multilateral trading system is built -- non-discrimination and transparency -- are at stake here. These core principles make the international trading environment more predictable and less complex. If we don\'t make sufficient progress in these negotiations and conclude them successfully, it is the poorest countries that will lose the most.

IS THERE STILL HOPE?

Generalised terrorism, whether that of Al Qaeda, of Sharon in Israel, or of US President Bush, arouses very real fears of calamity in the near future, writes Leonardo Boff, a writer and theologian. At times it seems we haven\'t yet seen the worst that could befall us. This situation raises a philosophical question: can we still place any hope in human beings? Are we capable of improving our social behaviour, our sense of humanity and morality, or are we condemned to live this tragedy to the very end until we destroy ourselves? It is always possible to improve, Boff writes, but humanity will improve only if the majority of its members do so. If this does not happen, we are finished. We will increase our destructive capabilities until tragedy is inevitable. But for this not to happen, one must assume the existence of a second factor: a philosophy of hope.

CURE ILLS OF GLOBALISATION BY DEMOCRATISING IT

The current process of globalisation is generating widespread distress, destroying traditional connections of solidarity, and marginalising entire countries and even entire regions while raising the risk of war, exclusion, hatred, and ethnic and religious conflict, writes Boutros-Boutros Ghali, UN Secretary General from 1992-1996. In this article, the author argues that the globalisation of the economy must be accompanied by the development of a global movement for democracy. Global democracy cannot be limited to a transformation of the structures of national democracy. Its objective must be a new architecture structured in such a way that it is controlled directly not by citizens but by states, multi-national corporations, non-governmental organisations, municipalities, and political parties. This will require the creation of new political institutions as well as the reform of the existing international institutions. While these ideas may seem futuristic or utopian, the author writes that peace among nations grounded in a democratisation of globalisation is a desirable, and reachable, goal.