Stories written by Greg Mills

THE FUTURE OF THE COMMONWEALTH

By Greg Mills and - -
As the date of its summit in Abuja, Nigeria, approaches (5-8 December), the Commonwealth finds itself polarised and apparently paralysed about what to do with Mugabe\'s Zimbabwe, writes Greg Nillas, National Director of the South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA) and the author of \'\'Poverty to Prosperity: Globalisation, Good Governance and African Recovery\'\'. As a result of Robert Mugabe\'s misrule from Harare, half of Zimbabwe\'s 13 million citizens face starvation, and many live under constant physical threat from his government. This situation stands in dire contrast to the values set forth in the Harare Declaration, Mills writes in this article. Human rights issues now threaten to divide the Commonwealth between North and South, between the developed and developing world, between the largely white and the largely black member-states. In spite of the labelling of the Abuja meeting as \'\'Development and Democracy: Partnership for Peace and Prosperity\'\', the agenda is likely to be dominated not only by Mugabe\'s Zimbabwe but also by the security situation in Iraq.

OLD AND NEW EUROPE

By Greg Mills and - -
Just when the leadership of France and Germany was commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Elysee Treaty, US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, irritated with Paris and Berlin for their opposition to war against Iraq, lashed out at the Franco-German position as simply coming from the \'\'old Europe\'\', writes Joaquin Roy, Jean Monnet professor and Director of European Union Centre at the University of Miami. In this article for IPS, Roy writes that to believe that Lithuania, Slovakia, or even Poland, because of their fast conversion from satellites of the Soviet Union are today the true representatives of Europe is preposterous. In the post-September 11th world, the \'\'old Europe\'\' is the one formed around the nucleus forged by two nations tragically mangled by self-inflicted wars that ended in near suicide (Germany) and humiliation and occupation (France) in World War II. Their leaders concluded that the only way to end their tendency to bloody conflict was to place the means of war under the control of common institutions. The grave danger raised by Rumsfeld\'s remark is that the US might persist in considering the European doubts irrelevant. The risk is that the US will decide to carry out the war by itself and believes that others will follow. Only when the cards are down on the Security Council table or the first shots are fired over Iraq will we know the truth. Until now, fortunately, only words and pots of ink have been launched. It is an improvement, given past experience.
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