By Mairead Maguire
BELFAST, Jul 13 2015 (IPS)

The year 2015 marked the 62^nd anniversary of the armistice agreement that ended the Korean War. The temporary ceasefire has never been replaced with a peace treaty and the demilitarised zone (DMZ) continues to divide the country.

The DMZ with its barbed wire, armed soldiers on both sides, and littered with thousands of explosive landmines, is the most militarised border in the world.

Mairead Maguire

Seventy years ago, as the Cold War was brewing,  the United States unilaterally drew the line across the 38^th parallel – with the former Soviet Union’s agreement – dividing an ancient country that had just suffered 35 years of Japanese colonial occupation.

Koreans had no desire to be divided, or decision-making power to stop their country from being divided; now, seven decades later, the conflict on the Korean peninsula threatens peace in the Asia-Pacific region and throughout our world.

One of the greatest tragedies arising out of man-made ‘Cold War’ politics and isolation is the tearing apart of Korean families and their physical separation from each other. In Korean culture, family relations are deeply important and many families have been painfully separated for 70 years.

Although there was a period of reconciliation during the Sunshine Policy years (1998-2007) between the two Korean governments, when some families had the joy of reunion, this has stopped due to a souring of relationships between North and South Korea.

Through sanctions and isolationist policies put in place by the International community, the North Korean people and their economy have also continued to suffer.

While North Korea has come a long way from the 1990s when up to one million died from famine, many people are poor, and feel isolated and marginalised from South Korea and the outside world.“I must admit that before this visit, my first to the North, I never realised how deeply passionate North Koreans are for reunification with the South and how much they want to open the borders so they can welcome their South Korea families to visit and normalise relationships”

As members of the one human family, and in order to show human solidarity and empathise  with our North Korean family, to bring global attention to the ‘forgotten’ Korean war, and to call for an engagement with North Korea and a peace treaty,  a group of international women came together to visit North/South Korea and walk across the DMZ.

On May 22, 2015, International Women’s Day for Peace and Disarmament, thirty women peacemakers from 15 countries made a historic crossing of the two-mile-wide DMZ from North to South Korea.

The delegation included feminist author/activist Gloria Steinem, two Nobel peace laureates,  Leymah Gbowee and myself, coordinator Christine Ahn (whose dream it was  to cross the DMZ) and  long-time peace activists, human rights defenders, spiritual leaders and Korean experts.

During our four-day  visit to North Korea, before crossing the DMZ on May 24, we had the privilege and joy of meeting many North Korean women.

At a peace symposium in Pyongyang, we listened as North Korean women spoke of their horrific experiences of war and division, and listened as some of our delegation shared how they had mobilised to end conflict and build peace in their communities.

We also participated in huge peace walks in Pyongyang and Kaesong, with the participation of many thousands of North Korean women in beautiful traditional Korean costumes. The women carried banners calling for the reunification of families and of Korea, a peace treaty and no war.

The walks were deeply moving, especially in Kaesong where families came out onto their balconies to wave as we passed.

I must admit that before this visit, my first to the North, I never realised how deeply passionate North Koreans are for reunification with the South and how much they want to open the borders so they can welcome their South Korea families to visit and normalise relationships.

North Koreans told us that Korean people are one people. Though they have different political ideologies, they speak the same language, have the same culture, and share a painful history of war and division.

Policies of isolation have not solved any problems and our delegates believe that a new approach of engagement and a peace treaty is necessary.  

Our walk brought renewed attention to the importance of world solidarity in ending the Korean conflict, particularly since the 1953 armistice agreement was signed by North Korea, (South Korea did not sign) China and the United States on behalf of the U.N. Command that included sixteen countries.

It helped highlight the responsibility of the international community, whose governments were complicit in the division of Korea 70 years ago, to support Korea’s peaceful reconciliation and reunification.

The challenges of overcoming Korea’s division became apparent in the complex negotiations over our DMZ crossing between North and South Korea, as well as with the U.N. Command, which has formal jurisdiction over the DMZ.

Although we had hoped to cross at Panmunjom, the ‘Truce Village’ where the armistice was signed, we decided, after both South Korea and the U.N. Command had denied our crossing, that we would take the route agreed by all parties in the spirit of compromise lest our actions further strain already tense North-South relations.

In Seoul, we met with some opposition. Although we did not meet with any heads of state or endorse any political or economic system, maintaining a neutral stance throughout, it was apparent that divisions within South Korea itself were manifested in some of the ideologically divided forms of reception and reactions that we witnessed.

We recognise that our international women’s peace walk is only a beginning and we will continue our focus on increasing civilian exchanges and women’s leadership, highlighting the obligation of all parties involved to decrease militarisation and move towards a peace treaty.

We therefore urge increased engagement at every level – civil, economic, cultural, academic and governmental – and especially citizen-to-citizen diplomacy in peacebuilding, as an alternative to full military conflict, which is not an option. (END/COLUMNIST SERVICE)

Edited by Phil Harris   

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

By Christine Ahn and Suzy Kim
HONOLULU, Dec 2 2014 (IPS)

On Nov. 18, a committee of the United Nations General Assembly voted 111 to 19, with 55 abstentions, in favour of drafting a non-binding resolution referring North Korea to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Christine Ahn

While there is overwhelming evidence that economic and political conditions in North Korea must improve, missing from debates in U.N. corridors is the fact that the unresolved Korean War (1950-1953) underlies North Korea’s human rights crisis."While there is overwhelming evidence that economic and political conditions in North Korea must improve, missing from debates in U.N. corridors is the fact that the unresolved Korean War (1950-1953) underlies North Korea's human rights crisis"

After claiming up to four million lives with at least one member of every family in North Korea killed by the war, the Korean War was halted by an armistice agreement signed by North Korea, China and the United States representing the United Nations Command.

Suzy Kim

As James Laney, U.S. Ambassador to South Korea during the 1990s explains, “one of the things that have bedevilled all talks until now is the unresolved status of the Korean War” and he prescribes the “establishment of a peace treaty to replace the truce.”

What does the past have to do with the present state of human rights in North Korea?

The continued state of war affects the human rights of North Korean people today in at least two ways. Domestically, the North Korean government prioritises military defence and national security over human security and political freedoms. Internationally, North Koreans suffer due to political isolation and economic sanctions.

The fact that the Korean War ended with a temporary ceasefire rather than a permanent peace treaty gives the North Korean government justification – whether we like it or not – to invest heavily in the country’s militarisation.

According to the South Korean government’s Institute of Defense Analyses, North Korea invests approximately 8.7 billion dollars – or one-third of its GDP – on defence.

Pyongyang even acknowledged last year how the un-ended war has forced it “to divert large human and material resources to bolstering up the armed forces though they should have been directed to the economic development and improvement of people’s living standards.”

Since military intervention is not an option, the Barack Obama administration has used sanctions to pressure North Korea to denuclearise. Instead, North Korea has since conducted three nuclear tests, calling sanctions “an act of war”.

That is because sanctions have had deleterious effects on the day-to-day lives of ordinary North Korean people. “In almost any case when there are sanctions against an entire people, the people suffer the most and the leaders suffer least,” said former U.S. President Jimmy Carter on his last visit to North Korea.

International sanctions have made it extremely difficult for North Koreans to access basic necessities, such as food, seeds, medicine and technology. Felix Abt, a Swiss entrepreneur who has conducted business in North Korea for over a decade says that it is “the most heavily sanctioned nation in the world, and no other people have had to deal with the massive quarantines that Western and Asian powers have enclosed around its economy.” 

Whether in Pyongyang, Seoul or Washington, the threat of war or terrorism has been used to justify government repression and overreach, such as warrantless surveillance, imprisonment and torture (“enhanced interrogation techniques”) in the name of preserving national security.

In South Korea, one of the liberal opposition parties, the Unified Progressive Party, is currently on trial in the Constitutional Court on charges made by the Park Geun-hye government that its members conspired with North Korea to overthrow the South Korean government.

Amnesty International says that this case “has seriously damaged the human rights improvement of South Korean society which has struggled and fought for freedom of thoughts and conscience and freedom of expression.”

In the coming days, the U.N. General Assembly will vote on whether the U.N. Security Council should refer North Korea to the ICC, although it is likely to be vetoed by China and Russia. The United Nations vote, while lofty in principle, actually serves to further isolate Pyongyang, which will likely retreat even further behind its iron curtain.

“We’ve said from day one that if North Korea wants to rejoin the community of nations, it knows how to do it,” U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has said, referring to the precondition of denuclearisation for talks.

Instead of relying on the failed Washington policy of “strategic patience” it is time for a bold move that will truly bring North Korea into the community of nations, leaving no excuse to delay addressing human rights – sign a peace treaty to end the state of war. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

(Edited by Phil Harris)

The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

By Mairead Maguire
SARAJEVO, Jun 5 2014 (IPS)

On this Friday, June 6, people from all corners of the world gather here in Sarajevo, Bosnia, to explore a plethora of ideas on the road forward to a world in peace.

Sarajevo once was the scene of the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand that led to the start of the First World War in 1914. The shot fired in Sarajevo a century ago set off, like a starting pistol, a race for power, two global wars, a Cold War, a century of immense, rapid explosion of death and destruction technology, all extremely costly, and extremely risky.

Mairead Maguire

A huge step in the history of war, but also a decisive turning point in the history of peace. The peace movement has never been as strong politically as in the last three decades before the break-out of the First World War. It was a factor in political life, literature, organisation, and planning, the Hague Peace Conferences, the Hague Peace Palace and the International Court of Arbitration, and Bertha von Suttner’s bestseller, ‘Lay Down Your Arms!’.

Optimism was high as to what this ‘new science’ of peace could mean to humankind. Parliaments, Kings and Emperors, great cultural and business personalities involved themselves. The great strength of the movement was that it did not limit itself to civilising and slowing down militarism, it demanded its total abolition. People were presented with an alternative, and they saw common interest in this alternative road forward for humankind.

What happened in Sarajevo a hundred years ago was a devastating blow from which the movement never really recovered. Now, 100 years later, must be the time for a thorough reappraisal of the merits of the original vision of disarmament, what we have done without it, the need for a recommitment, a new ambitious start offering new hope to a humanity suffering under the scourge of militarism and wars.“We need to acknowledge that our common humanity and human dignity are more important than our different traditions. We can solve our problems without killing each other” – Mairead Maguire

People are tired of armaments and war. They have seen that they release uncontrollable forces of tribalism and nationalism. We need to acknowledge that our common humanity and human dignity are more important than our different traditions. We can solve our problems without killing each other. We need to accept and celebrate diversity and otherness. We need to give and accept forgiveness, and choose non-killing and non-violence as ways to solve our problems.

We are also challenged to build structures through which we can cooperate and which reflect our interdependence. The vision of the European Union (EU) founders to link countries together economically in order to lessen the likelihood of war among the nations is a worthy endeavour.

Unfortunately instead of providing help for E.U. citizens, we are witnessing the growing militarisation of Europe, its role as a driving force, under the leadership of the United States/NATO, towards rearmament and a new ‘cold’ war and military aggression. The EU and many of its countries used to take initiatives in the United Nations for peaceful settlements of conflicts. Traditionally peaceful countries, like Norway and Sweden, are now among the most important U.S./NATO war assets. The EU threatens to end the neutrality of several nations.

Many nations have been drawn into complicity in breaking international law through U.S./U.K./NATO wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and so on. I believe that NATO should be abolished and that the United Nations should be reformed and actively take up its mandate to save the world from the scourge of war.

But there is hope. People are saying no to militarism and war and insisting on disarmament. Now is the time to take inspiration from many who have gone before us, like Bertha von Suttner, who was the first woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize in l905.

It was Von Suttner who moved Alfred Nobel to set up the Nobel Peace Prize award and it was her movement and ideas that Nobel decided to support in his testament for the ‘Champions of Peace’, that is, those who struggled for disarmament and replacing power with law and International relations.

That these ideas were what Nobel wished to support is clearly confirmed by three expressions in his will, about creating the fraternity of nations, work for abolition of armies, and the holding of peace congresses. It is important the Nobel Committee be faithful to his wishes and that prizes go to the true Champions of Peace that Nobel had in mind.

This 100-year-old programme for global disarmament confronted militarism in a fundamental way. It challenges today´s peace movement to rethink. Is it sufficient to ask for improvements and reforms, or is it necessary to be an alternative to militarism? This aberration and dysfunctional system goes completely against the true spirit of men and women, which is to love and be loved and solve our problems through cooperation, dialogue, non-violence and conflict resolution.

The Sarajevo event gathers a diversity of activists together and lets them feel the warmth and strength of being among thousands of friends and enriched by the variety of peace people, and ideas. Participants will be inspired and energised to pursue their different projects, be it arms trade, nuclear, non-violence, culture of peace, drone warfare, etc. But soon they shall be back home, and know all too well how they often are being met with indifference or a remote stare.

The problem is not that people do not like what they say; what they understand correctly is that little can be done, as the world is. But peace people want a different world. Diverse as their work is, a common vision of a world without arms, militarism and war is indispensable for success. Can the movement achieve real change if it does not confront and reject militarism entirely, as the aberration, or dysfunction, that it is in human history? Is it not time that all countries come together in an agreement to abolish all weapons and war, and to commit to always sort out all differences through international law and institutions?

While it is impossible in Sarajevo to make a common peace programme, it must be possible to commit to a common goal. If the common dream is a world without weapons and militarism, why not say so? Why be silent about it?

It would make a world of difference if peace work no longer be scattered attempts to modify the military. Each activist should see their effort as part of a great, global endeavour. Across all divisions of national borders, religions and races, one goal should be clear: to be an alternative, insisting on an end to militarism and violence. This would mean, for each one, an entirely different chance to be listened to and taken seriously.

Sarajevo, where peace once ended, must become the bold starting point of a universal call for peace through the wholesale abolition of militarism. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

Excerpt:

Since the collapse of the former Soviet Union, the United States has developed from a super power into a hyper power, says Subrata Ghoshroy, researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This development has far reaching negative consequences in terms of global security – continual promotion of the international arms race as well as persistent devaluation of diplomacy and international law.

As one of the key speakers at a symposium on ‘Science between War and Peace’ held in Berlin from May 16 to 18 one hundred years after the outbreak of the First World War, Ghoshroy highlighted the militarisation and utilisation of research for war purposes in the United States. The Berlin symposium was organised by ‘Network 1914-2014’, an alliance of peace groups including the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms (IALANA) and the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW).

Subrata Ghoshroy. Credit: Karina Boeckmann/IPS

In an interview with IPS, Ghoshroy, an engineer of Indian descent, describes how sophisticated weapon systems are being used as dominant instruments of U.S. foreign policy. Ghoshroy himself had worked in the field of high-energy laser before he turned defence analyst and whistleblower against faked ‘Star Wars’ missile defence tests by U.S. government contractors. At MIT, a private research university in the U.S. city of Cambridge, he directs a project to promote nuclear stability in South Asia.

IPS: We are experiencing ongoing militarisation and the use of research for military purposes. Are peace scientists like you an endangered species?

Ghoshroy: Yes, and very much so, unfortunately. The term ‘peace scientist’ really doesn’t exist in the United States. It’s more in a German context that you have these terms such as ‘Friedensforschung’. There are individual scientists who are opposed to war. They express themselves. But there is really no discipline.

So, individuals do things their own way. And of course there are scientists all over the United States with the heritage of the Manhattan Project, the U.S.-led research and development project that produced the first atomic bombs in the 1940s. All these scientists from top universities worked there, they came back and became very much against the bomb. And there is some legacy of them still lingering in U.S. departments, particularly in physics departments where more people have become more anti-war and openly speak if not write about the problems of military research – but very few.“The collapse of one super power, the Soviet Union, marked the beginning of the United States as a hyper power. Blind faith in technology fuelled unilateralism” – Subrata Ghoshroy

IPS: How much of U.S. academic research is sponsored by the Defence Department and how much is being invested annually?

Ghoshroy: In the United States, the Defence Department spends together about three billion dollars annually in universities. In certain disciplines – in physical sciences, in engineering, materials engineering, aerospace, mechanical engineering, physics, chemistry and computer science – the support from the military is absolutely crucial and dominating. So, if you look at numbers in electro-engineering, 72 percent of all research at U.S. universities is funded by the military, and in mechanical engineering maybe 60 percent and in computer science maybe 55 percent.

IPS: There is a long history of using academic research for military purposes. How has it developed since the end of the Cold War and 9/11 (the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States)?

Ghoshroy: The real collaboration between science and the military started with the Manhattan Project (a research and development project that produced the first atomic bombs during the Second World War II. That was the beginning. And then, after the war ended in 1945, this military had already established laboratories in different universities like MIT and other schools. So, they wanted to see how they could continue this relationship after the war and they came up with this plan that the military would invest massively and it would be very easy politically to support spending on science if it was done through the military.

Public support for the military was very strong after the defeat of fascism. The Second World War was a tremendous thing for the Americans. So they wanted to keep doing it and found a way for all science to be done through the military and then they would get support in Congress for this.

As the Cold War developed, the new rationale was science and technology to give the United States the upper hand against the Soviet Union. I believe that this paradigm that started after the end of the Second World War and continued throughout the Cold War has been maintained in all the years since the collapse of the Soviet Union. But there is no big enemy, no enemy that we need so much money for our military to defeat. Russia spends so little money compared with the United States or China, also although it’s coming up. But regardless, all this spending on weapons is primarily coming from the United States. The universities, the military and its contractors, they all act together to promote science and science for weapons.

IPS: And since the beginning of the so called war against terrorism?

Ghoshroy: After 9/11, the public was completely terrified, so it gave the government tremendous power to do anything and, yes, it gave the military and universities money for everyone who wanted to go into research to support the so-called war on terrorism. I would not say that the money has increased so much for research. Money has increased for other things like homeland security. But it certainly has given them another opportunity to support and boost science to fight this new enemy.

IPS: You have said that since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States super power has turned into a hyper power. What have been the consequences?

A: Well, first of all, they are really blinded by this position that they have now. Nobody can do any check and balance on their actions. When I was in Congress, when we discussed foreign policy in meetings of the staff in Congress to advise members, there were no counter arguments against what they were doing. They would say “we will prevail, eventually; there are some people making noises, but that doesn’t matter, we will prevail.”

This is very dangerous. This vision of America – being a force for and doing good in the world – is really believed by the people and policy makers. But in many instances, or actually most instances, they are certainly doing the opposite. They don’t understand different cultures, the peculiarities of different societies and civilisations, so they see everything in this American way. “Our democracy, our form of democracy, is the right one” even though there are other civilisations that have lived for thousands of years.

The collapse of one super power, the Soviet Union, marked the beginning of the United States as a hyper power. Blind faith in technology fuelled unilateralism, variously termed as humanitarian, pre-emptive and regime change interventions. This hyper power is totally defying the United Nations, it is totally against everything. That has led to lawlessness in and out the country. “We don’t like the government in Iraq. So let’s go change it.”  But, I am optimistic that the post-Cold War order may be coming to an end.

IPS: Are we experiencing a devaluation of diplomacy?

Ghoshroy: Definitely. U.S. foreign policy always talks about diplomacy. But American diplomacy means that you speak softly but carry a big stick. This is how they operate. So the big stick is always there.

Diplomacy is about give and take. U.S. policy is not diplomacy in that way. Yes, they have their diplomats who sit down across the table with the people of Iran or wherever. But the moment that their plan is not accepted, diplomacy is over. They will bomb. So they don’t care about diplomacy in the original sense of the term where you negotiate for a peaceful solution of give and take. Either, it’s my way or the highway.

IPS: Is the economic downturn a chance to counter the trend of militarisation and reduce military expenditure?

Ghoshroy: It does offer an opportunity, but it’s a very hard uphill battle. Cutting a military budget is very difficult in the United States because military contractors are very tied to politicians, no matter whether they are Republicans or Democrats. All these people and their election campaigns receive funds from the military contractors like Lockheed and Boeing and the others all have strong lobbyists in Washington. All sides are benefitting.

IPS: What are the chances of winning the war against wars?

Ghoshroy: It’s a slow process. In the United State there is a lack of political consciousness. The country is isolated. And in the media you read what is being propagated by the establishment.

In Viet Nam, the public reacted against the war when thousands of their beloved ones came back in body bags. In wars such as in Iraq and Afghanistan the number of victims is relatively low. Further, journalists were not allowed to photograph the returning dead. And there is another big difference. The people being killed are not middle class people who can influence the system.

Yet, People are turning against these wars, although it is not moral but economic reasons that are the decisive factors.

IPS: European members of NATO rarely criticise the United States for its unilateral warfare. Do you have any advice for them?

Ghoshroy: I have been saying in many meetings that it would be so fantastic if European countries like Germany that suffered and inflicted so much pain on other countries in the world were to be the ones to take the initiative to stand up against the United States in terms of what they want to do with NATO.

First of all, we need its dissolution. It should have been dissolved when the Warsaw Pact was dissolved. It has no mission. And I think stopping warmongering in Europe would be a further important first step for world peace. It’s unfortunate that despite people’s actual strong support for non-intervention, even the so-called parties of the Left in Europe, like the French Socialists or the Greens in Germany, support strengthening NATO. This is not helpful in terms of building peace.

By Jan Oberg
LUND, Sweden, May 6 2014 (Columnist Service)

Over the last 25-30 years Sweden’s military, security and foreign policy elites have changed Sweden’s policy 180 degrees.

These fundamental changes were initiated by the Social Democratic government under Prime Minister Goran Persson (1996–2006) and have been carried out with virtually no public debate.

The rapprochement with interventionism, militarism and the U.S./NATO in all fields has been planned, incremental, furtive and dishonest; in short, unworthy of a democracy.

These elites are more loyal to Brussels and Washington than to the Swedes.

If your image of Sweden is that of a progressive, innovative and peace-promoting country with a global mindset, an advocate of international law, it is – sad to say – outdated.

Sweden is no longer neutral and it is only formally non-aligned; there is no closer ally than the U.S./NATO, although it is not a NATO member. It has stopped developing policies of its own and basically positions itself in the European Union and NATO framework. It no longer produces important new thinking – the last was Olof Palme’s Commission on Common Security (1982).

Jan Oberg

It has no disarmament ambassador and does not consider the United Nations important; there is not a single Swede among the U.N. Blue Helmets.

Nuclear abolition is far down on the agenda, problematic as a NATO-aspiring country. But one thing has not changed: Sweden remains the world’s largest arms exporter per capita.

Sweden no longer contributes to the protection of smaller states through a commitment to international law. Its elite wholeheartedly supported the bombing of Serbia/Kosovo. It thought – also under Social Democratic leadership – that the mass-killing sanctions on Iraq and the occupation were appropriate.

Sweden supported the destruction of Libya – participating with its planes there, although it only carried out reconnaissance, not bombing, missions.

Sweden did not support the planned war on Syria but also did not voice any audible criticism of the West’s support of only the militant opposition, including Al-Qaeda affiliates.

Sweden’s foreign minister Carl Bildt operates mainly as an eminently well-informed international affairs traveler and blogger who doesn’t seem to want to waste too much of his precious time on being a minister. And when he does, he isn’t known for consulting many people around him.

Here follow a few recent events/news which further emphasise the deplorable path Sweden – the elites rather than the people – have decided to follow.

1. Sweden’s security political elite has lately been considering broader alliances with NATO and the EU. How enigmatic! After having been neutral and non-aligned during tough confrontations and tension in the Cold War years, Sweden now needs to join NATO when there is no single analysis anywhere indicating that it is likely that Sweden will be faced with a threat in the foreseeable future.

While the intelligent security and defence discourse is now about human security, the environment and high-tech challenges, Sweden’s elites talk about defence as weapons only.

This is dangerous ”group think” steered by bureaucratic vested interests and paid for by taxpayers who are de facto threatened more by these interests than by Russian President Vladimir Putin. A reality check would lead to a reality shock.

2. Swedish planes shall now, in the light of a conveniently hysterical interpretation of the crisis in Ukraine, equip its planes with cruise missiles.

The security priesthood of the country consists of a handful of researchers on military affairs at huge, well-financed state institutes in close contact with politicians and the military with whom military-loyal journalists have close bonds.

The country that once did something for a better world has joined the militarist world. At a time when both NATO and the U.S. are getting weaker, Sweden’s elites plan to put all Sweden’s eggs in that basket.

It has no policy vis–à–vis, say, the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) countries or any vision of the world in 20 years to navigate towards. It has no ideals, values or commitments, only a ”follow-the-U.S./NATO and EU” flock mentality.

3. The U.S. ambassador to Sweden, Mark Brzezinski, recently told Sweden to join NATO, otherwise it won’t get any help in the event of an attack – in short, blackmailing disguised as deep concern and generous offer to bring (conditional) help. This was revealed by the conservative Swedish daily, Svenska Dagbladet.

The message is based on “fearology2 – because everybody knows that should Russia attack anyone, Sweden would not be the first target and it would be in the interest of NATO to control Swedish territory before any spreading of Russian forces from somewhere else to the Nordic area.

In short, NATO’s interest in Sweden is much greater than Sweden’s in NATO. Whatever one may think of these fantasies, they are just that: No one has thought up a credible scenario for how Sweden would be invaded by Russia and remain defenceless.

But this is the military-fundamentalist propaganda the Swedes are the target of these years: We must join NATO because we have such a weak defence that we can’t defend ourselves!

The liberal party’s defence policy spokesman, Allan Widman, recently stated this in a manner indicative of the low intellectual level of defence discussions here: ”I can only state the fact that Russia has about 140 million people and Sweden nine million. We won’t be able to manage serious challenges from outside on our own…”

Now, if the Swedish military can’t provide any protection for the nine million Swedes with a budget of eight billion dollars (among the 10 percent highest per capita in the world) at its disposal, it’s time to ask how inefficient and cost-maximising it can be without its leadership being fired.

4. Just this week it was decided that AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System), planes can pass through Swedish airspace in connection with NATO’s Ukraine crisis missions.

5. Sweden (like Finland) is discussing how to receive military aid, including troops, from NATO. This goes beyond what NATO members Denmark, Norway and Iceland have ever accepted. And Sweden is not a NATO member!

This must not be Sweden’s future.
(END/COPYRIGHT IPS)

Excerpt:

Ruins of the Abu Khadra complex for civil adminstration following an Israeli airstrike on Gaza City. Credit: Mohammed Omer/IPS

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 28 2012 (IPS)

A long outstanding international conference on a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East, scheduled to take place in Finland next month, has been postponed, giving rise to speculation on whether it will ever get off the ground.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, a vigorous opponent of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), remains hopeful the conference will take place sometime next year.

“I have also personally engaged with the states of the region at the highest level to underline the importance of the conference in promoting long-term regional stability, peace and security on the basis of equality,” he said.

But Dr. Rebecca Johnson, director of the Acronym Institute for Disarmament Diplomacy, told IPS it is appalling for the people of the Middle East that militarism is still destroying the lives of civilians.

“If the recent tragic developments have also derailed the important Conference on freeing the Middle East of weapons of mass destruction, it will be important to convene early in 2013,” she said.

Dr. Johnson said the date need not be a deal-breaker – but this delay makes it even more important now to start a determined and constructive process to eliminate nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction (WMD) from the region.

“If the meeting cannot launch an effective process early in 2013, there will be serious consequences not only for the region but for the credibility of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), demonstrating yet another failure to deliver on its essential agreements,” she warned.

The proposal for the meeting was endorsed by 189 member states at the Review Conference on the NPT held at the United Nations in May 2010.

The Israeli government, while criticising the outcome document of that Review Conference, left the door open for participation in the proposed conference.

But the political uprisings in the Arab world, including the ouster of the Israeli-friendly Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, have triggered expressions of Israeli concern – specifically its own security in an increasingly hostile environment.

In a statement released Monday, the secretary-general said he reaffirms his “firm resolve and commitment, together with the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States, in consultation with the states of the region, to convene a conference to be attended by all states of the Middle East.”

The focus, he said, will be on the establishment of a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction, on the basis of arrangements freely arrived at by the states of the region.

Hillel Schenker, co-editor of the Palestine-Israel Journal, told IPS that while it’s unfortunate the Helsinki conference will not be convened in 2012, the fact that Ban Ki-moon and the co-conveners, the U.S., UK and Russia, remain committed to the process is very encouraging.

It’s understandable, given the circumstances, he said, that it was difficult to convene the conference in December 2012.

However, the recent statement by the secretary-general expressing hope that the Finnish facilitator will be able “to conduct multilateral consultations in the shortest possible time which will allow the conference to be convened in the earliest possible time in 2013”, means that this valuable process will continue.

“For the conference to succeed, it is crucial that both Iran and Israel be at the table,” Schenker noted. “Hopefully the facilitator, perhaps with the aid of the Americans, will be able to convince the Israeli government of the importance of engaging in this process.”

Still, he said, the Helsinki Conference remains an historic opportunity to move forward on a parallel track, towards the creation of a regional security regime which will contain a Nuclear and WMD-Free Zone and towards Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Arab comprehensive peace.

Meanwhile, the United States which traditionally throws a protective arm around Israel, has already laid down a condition in advance of the pre-conference preparations.

In July 2010, when Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu met with U.S. President Barack Obama, he was assured the Middle East conference would not single out Israel.

A White House statement also insisted the conference would only take place “if all countries feel confident they can attend, and that any efforts to single out Israel will make the prospects of convening such a conference unlikely.”

Speaking at a symposium on “Faith, Dialogue and Integration” at the United Nations Monday, Jonathan Granoff, president of the Global Security Institute, said nuclear weapons represent a form of security apartheid.

Like apartheid, both sides are injured. And those threatened reasonably feel the terror of destruction, he added, pointing out that those threatening have their moral foundations corroded or live in denial of what they are doing.

“The continued reliance on these horrific devices provides the modern world with its most severe and divisive irony,” he said.

The means of pursuing security are serving to breed insecurity. And the inequity inherent in the system pulls at the fabric of human unity, he added.

As Vartan Gregorian of the Carnegie Corporation recently pointed out, “All declared nuclear powers – the U.S., Russia, Great Britain, France, and China and now India and Pakistan (Israel as an undeclared nuclear power) – insist they possess nuclear weapons only to deter others from using them.”

Yet there have been many times in the past, and there will surely be times in the future, when major powers have used their nuclear capability to gain some political end by intimidation, he said.

Intimidation through the threat of annihilation of millions of innocent people is unjustified legally, morally, and remains the greatest threat to the stimulation of the proliferation of weapons, said Granoff. Thus, continued threat to use these weapons is impractical.

“One must therefore wonder if the irrational pride of power informs the policies of those who seek to perpetuate and ‘improve’ their arsenals of devastation,” he said.

Master Warrant Officer Scott Bridger, of the Canadian Contribution Training Mission – Afghanistan (CCTM-A), salutes during the 9/11 10-year anniversary ceremony at Camp Phoenix in Kabul. Credit: DND-MDN Canada

By Paul Weinberg
TORONTO, Nov 21 2012 (IPS)

Canada’s military buying binge under the current Conservative government has hit a financial brick wall in these austere times, but there is no nostalgic return in sight for Ottawa’s once robust participation in United Nations-led peacekeeping missions.

Walter Dorn is one of the very few professors in the Canadian Forces’ military schools still teaching a course on peace support operations to Canadian officers. “There is a tendency in the senior ranks to look down on U.N. peacekeeping,” he told IPS.

During the Cold War tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union, Canada was a recognised international leader in terms of offering its military to mediate between warring parties in hotspots like Cyprus and the Suez.

But following the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and especially after the 9/11 terror attacks on New York and Washington, Canada has reoriented the Canadian Forces with new purchases of planes, ships and other expensive hardware to play its part in the so-called “war on terror” led by the United States.

The tipping point came in the last decade, when Canada contributed a few thousand soldiers and support personnel to the NATO mission in Afghanistan, now fighting a difficult and protracted war against the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban forces, which previously ran the Central Asian country.

Compared to the U.S. or UK contingents, it is a relatively modest deployment. But for Canada, the self-declared “peaceable kingdom”, the Afghan engagement also represented a sea change for a country that had not participated in a major war since sending soldiers to the Korean peninsula in the early 1950s.

“(We) have put so much more emphasis on counterinsurgency operations that peacekeeping dropped by the wayside. Plus, there are now so many (Canadian) officers who don’t have experience in peacekeeping operations,” added Dorn.

Another major change was the planned long-term outlay of 490 billion dollars for new military hardware, including the controversial F-35 stealth jet fighters and an array of new naval vessels, as part of the Canada First defence strategy –ironically introduced by the pro-military Conservative federal government in 2008, the year of the world financial crisis.

Canada First also included a commitment to both extended international missions such as Afghanistan and shorter term deployments “in response to crises elsewhere in the world” such as Libya, where Canadian jet fighters and one naval war ship participated in the 2011 NATO mission to assist in the overthrow of the Muammar Gaddafi.

But the promised 490 billion dollars was never very realistic and is finally being reconfigured to meet a new financial situation in Canada, said Philippe Lagassé, a University of Ottawa defence expert.

“It wasn’t affordable to begin with, and it certainly is not affordable now,” he told IPS.

Recently, Prime Minister Stephen Harper made it plain in his across-the-board austerity cuts for federal government departments and agencies that the very large Department of National Defence can easily reduce its excessive administrative costs without doing damage to the Canadian Forces operations.

“Within very real budgetary constraints, Canada needs to maintain a modern, general purpose military capability,” Harper told reporters.

Essentially, DND is being instructed to take out 2.5 billion dollars from its annual 22.8-billion-dollar annual budget.

University of South California Canada specialist Patrick James describes this announcement as a “blessing in disguise” for Harper because it permits the PM to fully implement his 2006 election promise to ramp up security for a resource-rich and insufficiently defended Arctic, now undergoing warming because of climate change.

“Canada doesn’t have anything like the military spending of the United States, even per capita for the moment. But it is getting pretty big and it is not a bad idea when you have a bureaucracy that has been expanding steadily for an indefinite period of time to have a pause as you will and take a really cold, hard look,” James, author of “Canada and Conflict”, told IPS.

Yet there is resistance in DND, resulting in a rift between these natural allies, the Conservatives and the Canadian military, observes Lagassé.

“I think this government feels burned by the procurements. They don’t feel that Afghanistan really turned out all that well for them,” he said.

“Both the military and the Conservatives approached each other with the assumption that they were going to be very close. Like any government, they are starting to realise that DND kind has a mind of its own, and it does its own thing. That is not easy for them to deal with.”

This is a complete switch from what occurred after Harper and the Conservatives came to power in 2006, initially heading a minority government, and faced an Afghan combat mission started by the previous Liberal government. The then new prime minster made the declaration that Canada would not “cut and run” from its responsibilities under NATO.

Michael Skinner, a researcher with the York Centre for International and Security Studies, argues that the differences between Harper and the military are somewhat overblown.

“Whether it is orchestrated or not, the options are really good for the government, they can play both sides. On one side they can say ‘we are pro-military and want to support Canadian forces,’ and on the other side, they can say to all of the peaceniks, ‘look we have to cut back on military spending,’” he told IPS.

Skinner says that the planned 2.5-billion-dollar cut in defence is reasonable and doable since it will probably include both buyout packages for middle-level DND administrators and close to retirement senior officers, and the winding down of the expensive Canadian Afghan combat mission.

“The Harper government is playing an accounting shell game in order to maintain its aggressive foreign policy regime while simultaneously instituting domestic austerity. Considering the CF/DND budget increased 30.9 billion since 2001, a rollback of two billion (or even 2.5 billion as one analyst claims) is not very significant,” he noted.

Israeli air force F-16I's sit on the tarmac. Its air power includes F-15 and F-16 fighter planes, E-2C Hawkeye reconnaissance aircraft, Kfir military trainers, Boeing mid-air refueling aircraft, and Apache, Chinook and Sikorsky Blackhawk helicopters. Credit: Darrell I. Dean, U.S. Air Force

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 17 2012 (IPS)

When the late Yasser Arafat, leader of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), was engaged in a heavily one-sided battle against a robustly-armed Israel in 2000, he admitted the Palestinians were completely outgunned by the Israelis.

As the the U.S.-supplied Cobra helicopters rained fire on the West Bank and Gaza, Arafat told reporters, “I have only one aeroplane,” alluding to his single-aircraft Palestinian airline.

Even in routine military jargon, an “aeroplane” no longer exists – particularly in an age of jet fighters and attack helicopters – proving how powerless the Palestinians remained as a fighting force against Israel.

The PLO’s rockets and machine guns at that time were overwhelmed by an Israeli military arsenal beefed up with some of the world’s most sophisticated military equipment.

The air force inventory included F-15 and F-16 fighter planes, E-2C Hawkeye reconnaissance aircraft, Kfir military trainers, Boeing mid-air refueling aircraft, and Apache, Chinook and Sikorsky Blackhawk helicopters – virtually all of them doled out mostly as outright military grants from the United States.

And as Hamas, the successor to the PLO, now finds itself in a military skirmish with Israel in Gaza, the long-range rockets falling on Israel are still unmatched by Israel’s missiles, warships, battle tanks, mortar, howitzers and air defence radar.

An Israeli fighter plane early this week blew up, with pinpoint accuracy, a vehicle carrying a Hamas military leader and his family.

Nearly 12 years after Arafat’s admission of military helplessness, the Palestinians seemed armed only with rockets, mortars, assault rifles and anti-aircraft guns against Israel’s laser-guided bombs, armoured vehicles, battle tanks and armoured personnel carriers.

In Middle Eastern politics, it is long established fact that no Arab country – or even a combination of Arab countries – would be able to overpower the Israelis.

The latest Global Militarisation Index released last week by the Bonn International Centre for Conversion (BICC) listed Israel as “the world’s most militarised nation”, followed by Singapore, Syria, Russia, Jordan and Cyprus.

Dan Darling, military markets analyst for Asia/Europe at Forecast International, told IPS that “in terms of raw firepower and military technologies Israel remains the most advanced military nation in the region”.

The defence exporting policy of the U.S., and to a lesser extent other European nations, is the retention of the status quo, he said.

“Thus every approved defence sale to an Arab nation in the Middle East is weighed against the consequent pressure brought to bear on Israel’s qualitative military edge (QME)”, he noted.

For instance, he pointed out, the next-generation F-35 Lightning II stealth fighter plane has been approved for sale to the Israelis, but is unlikely to get the go-ahead for interested Arab parties until the Israeli Air Force is equipped with the platform and its personnel brought up to speed on utilising and maintaining the aircraft.

“And even then the number of aircraft and the planes accompanying weapons and electronics suites approved for an Arab country will not be allowed to measure up to the level granted the Israelis,” said Darling.

The United States has also helped fund and develop Israeli anti-rocket/mortar/missile air-defence systems such as David’s Sling and Iron Dome.

Born in conflict, Israelis realise their country has to maintain a strong national security apparatus, Darling said.

On the domestic side, the Israeli defence electronics industry is well advanced in the area of unmanned aerial and ground platforms, he added.

In terms of pure spending, however, nobody in the region invests more in defence and security than Saudi Arabia (48-plus billion dollars in 2012).

Forecast International, a U.S. based company which also monitors arms sales worldwide, has ranked Israel second, regionally, in terms of defence budgets, at 14.7-15.0 billion dollars, just ahead of Iraq (14.6 billion dollars) and well ahead of the United Arab Emirates (10 billion dollars).

According to the 2012 Congressional Budget Justification put out by the U.S. State Department, outright U.S. military grants to Israel remained at 2.8 billion each in 2010 and 2011, rising to 3.1 billion dollars in 2012.

The State Department also said that 2009 marked the first year of a 10-year, 30-billion-dollar military financing memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Israel.

“U.S. assistance helps ensure that Israel maintains a qualitative military edge over potential regional threats, preventing a shift in the security balance in the region, and safeguarding U.S. interests,” the State Department said.

Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Friday he was extremely concerned about the continued violence in Gaza and Israel and deeply worried by the rising cost in terms of civilian lives.

Ban, who is planning a visit to the Middle East, “urgently appealed to all concerned to do everything under their command to stop this dangerous escalation and restore calm”.

Walking a thin line between the Israelis and the Palestinians, he said, “Rocket attacks are unacceptable and must stop at once. Israel must exercise maximum restraint.”

Meanwhile, the 15-member Security Council met at a late night session Thursday. But there was no decision on how to deal with the escalating violence.

Using grant funding from the Dept. of Homeland Security, UC Berkeley is preparing to buy an armoured vehicle, which it will share with the city. Credit: Gary Dorrington/IPS

By Judith Scherr
BERKELEY, California, Jun 22 2012 (IPS)

The city of Berkeley, California has long been regarded as a leader in the movements for peace, free speech and civil liberties. But this very city is now poised to follow the lead of hundreds of others around the United States where local police deploy armoured vehicles to fight crime and terrorism.

The University of California, Berkeley police department is using grant funds from the Department of Homeland Security to purchase a Lenco Ballistic Engineered Armoured Response Counter Attack Truck, better known as BearCat. The university will share the BearCat with police from Berkeley and the neighbouring city of Albany, where it will house the vehicle.

Purchasing the vehicle was raised at a Berkeley City Council meeting as part of a larger discussion on the city’s relationship to Homeland Security agencies that award grants and collect information on citizens.

Police Chief Michael Meehan defended the BearCat, telling the council he would have used it last year in a situation where a mentally ill man held off police officers with a gun for several hours. An armoured vehicle would have allowed negotiators to safely approach the suspect, Meehan said, although in this instance, police eventually took the man into custody without incident.

But Daniel Borgstrom, Occupy activist and former Marine, warned the council on Jun. 19 that the vehicle could be used to chill free speech.

“I’m asking, please stay out of this urban warfare stuff,” he said.

While Meehan called the armoured personnel carrier “a defensive resource” without weapons, Councilmember Max Anderson argued that the vehicle has gun ports and that weapons would be easy to supply.

“While we might count [the vehicle] as being protective of officers, they also carry an offensive component that could be misused under certain circumstances,” Anderson said.

No transparency

Citizens and councilmembers also criticised the secrecy with which the purchase was taking place.

Because the vehicle is being purchased by the university, and not a city governed by elected bodies, and because no matching funds were required – which the council would have had to approve – the Berkeley police department was not required to disclose the grant application.

Berkeley citizens found out about it only when the watchdog organisation, Berkeley Copwatch, discovered the project as a result of a Public Records Act request for general information on police equipment, according to Andrea Prichett of Copwatch.

The armoured vehicle has not been publicly discussed in Albany, and no such discussions are scheduled, according to Albany’s city clerk. Occupy Cal activists contacted for this story were unaware that the university was buying the armoured vehicle.

“I feel a certain level of – I have to use the word – betrayal,” attorney Sharon Adams told the council.

Adams works with a community coalition that has been meeting with police over concerns about local Homeland Security agencies, including the Urban Areas Security Initiative that is awarding the university about 200,000 dollars to purchase the BearCat.

“During all this time, police never told us they were going for this armoured tank,” she said.

Militarising cities – and police forces

Since 9/11 and with a surplus of combat equipment, armoured vehicles have become popular in larger higher-crime cities like Oakland, California, as well as tiny crime-free places like Keene, New Hampshire, where just two murders have been reported since 1999.

These armoured vehicles are part of “an alarming increase in militarisation” of the police, said Norm Stamper, former Seattle police chief and author of Breaking Rank: A Top Cop’s Exposé of the Dark Side of American Policing.

Stamper explained in a phone interview that, in addition to 9/11, the war on drugs has fuelled the drive toward police militarisation, exacerbating conflict between those targeted – people of color, youth and the poor – and law enforcement.

Once targeted, these communities become the enemy. “We start adding the military nomenclature and the military equipment and military tactics and strategies, and we find SWAT units hitting the house of somebody suspected of having half a bag of marijuana,” he said.

Locally, police militarisation was evident at the Nov. 9, 2011 Occupy Cal demonstration at UC Berkeley, where combat-gear clad police injured peaceful protesters with baton strikes, and on Oct. 25, 2011 in Oakland, when similarly armed police nearly killed a young former Marine when they fired a tear-gas canister that hit him in the head.

“There’s this mistaken belief, that if we harden the image of the police officers, that will give the forces of law and order more legitimacy,” Stamper said. “What it does, I think, is precisely the opposite.”

When police carry weapons and use chemical agents on non-violent demonstrators, they “appear to be the repressive arm of an oppressive establishment”, Stamper explained. An armoured personnel carrier would serve to reinforce that impression.

A necessary piece of equipment?

However, Stamper allowed, an armoured vehicle can save lives, when used correctly. When Stamper was on the San Diego police force in the 1980s, a man shot and killed 21 people at a McDonald’s restaurant over the course of more than an hour. An armoured vehicle could have ended the event more quickly, he said.

“That was a situation that calls for exactly what I’ve been condemning in our approach to demonstrations,” he said. “You need police officers with ballistic gear, ballistic helmets…you need an armoured personnel carrier, in a situation like that. But you certainly don’t need it when people are peaceably assembling and expressing their first amendment rights.”

Police Chief Meehan acknowledged the growing militarisation of police, noting that in a highly armed society and country like the United States, which has 200 to 300 million gun,”there’s a limited way to protect our officers, especially when you’re talking about gunfire”.

“However much I would love to have something that doesn’t look military that still does the same job, it is what it is,” he argued. “The equipment that is available to us is what we avail ourselves of.”

The question of whether the armed vehicle is necessary remains: the last time Berkeley police officers were killed by gunfire was in the 1970s; no UC Berkeley or Albany officers have been killed by guns, according to the website Officer Down Memorial Page.

Councilmember Kriss Worthington placed the armoured vehicle on next week’s Berkeley council agenda for further discussion. “If this is a joint application that includes the city of Berkeley and the city of Albany, it seems to me that there should be a public vote of the Albany City Council and the Berkeley City Council,” he said.

“It seems to be against the spirit of Berkeley for us to be using it.”