IDN-InDepthNews – Page 637 – News for a Sustainable World, Peace and Security

NEWSBRIEFS2017-09-262023-07-10

Mugabe Faults Late Mandela for Leaving South Africa to the Whites

By Global Information Network

NEW YORK | HARARE (IDN) – Thanks to the former South African leader, “Everything (today) is in the whites’ hands.” That was the harsh judgment of the legacy of President Nelson Mandela heard early September 2017 at a rally in Zimbabwe. It provoked a media whirlwind that rocked southern Africa.

“The most important thing for (Mandela) was his release from prison and nothing else,” Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe was widely reported to say. “He cherished that freedom more than anything else and forgot why he was put in jail.” Mugabe made his remarks in Shona at a ruling party rally in the central town of Gweru. NewZimbabwe.com translated these remarks.

NEWSBRIEFS2017-09-262023-07-10

Skeletal Remains of Hereros Give a New Twist to Genocide Case

By Global Information Network

NEW YORK (IDN) – The New York-based American Museum of Natural History is believed to be holding skeletal remains collected by a German racialist scientist who studied the Herero and Namaqua peoples of Namibia.

The find was announced earlier in September 2017 and will be included in a federal class action suit filed on behalf of the Hereros and Nama people by the New York attorney Kenneth McCallion.

The remains were originally gathered for use in experiments. According to representatives of the Namibian groups, skulls and skeletons dating to the German occupation of southwest Africa in the decades before World War 1 still remain in a museum archive. The museum has declined to comment.

OPINION2017-09-262023-07-10

Reminiscing ‘War Criminal’ McNamara as Trump Spits Out ‘Fire and Fury’ on North Korea

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power*

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – Out of the blue the war in Vietnam is in the news. Yet it is not the fiftieth anniversary of America’s defeat in Vietnam when North Vietnam caused it to flee. It’s only the forty-second.

Part of this must be fearful parallels with the moral and strategic blindness of President Donald Trump who seems to believe in uttering his life and death rhetoric, akin to President Richard Nixon’s on Vietnam, hoping to frighten the enemy into submission – in this case North Korea. Many people are worried that Trump is ready to fight America’s biggest war since Vietnam. As did Henry Kissinger, Nixon’s National Security Advisor, he appears to be considering the use of nuclear weapons.

OPINION2017-09-252023-07-10

Myanmar May be Able To Learn From Sri Lanka To Resolve the “Bengali” Problem

By Jayasri Priyalal*

SINGAPORE (IDN) – The Rohingya crisis and influx of refugees to Bangladesh is headline stories in the media at present. As a Sri Lankan I could note the similarity of the conflicts of statelessness that prevailed in Sri Lanka then and Myanmar at present, and Sri Lanka’s approach to solving the crisis with India could be a framework for Myanmar to follow.

In 1948 when Sri Lanka gained independence from Britain, the island nation was left with about one million Tamils who were called “Indian Tamils” in Sri Lanka. They were brought to Sri Lanka from South India from the lowest Dalit caste to work in tea plantations that were set up on land the British confiscated from Sinhala peasants, who refused to work in those plantations. Thus the presence of these Tamils was deeply resented by the Sinhalese. British have created a stateless community who were neither Indian nor Sri Lankan citizens.

CTBTO2017-09-242023-07-10

Conference Calls for Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Becoming International Law

By Jamshed Baruah

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) – “A CTBT that is in force would be a milestone on the road to a world free of nuclear weapons. It has the potential to prevent a nuclear arms race and an escalation of regional and bilateral tensions,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres. He was referring to the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) that bans nuclear testing on the Earth’s surface, in the atmosphere, underwater, and underground.

“Make no mistake: we need this Treaty,” said Miroslav Lajcák, President of the UN General Assembly. “I applaud the CTBT Preparatory Commission for raising awareness about the dangers associated with testing and for its partnership with the United Nations,” added Guterres.

UN INSIDER2017-09-242023-07-10

Making the 3rd Industrial Development Decade for Africa a Reality with Actions on the Ground

By J Nastranis

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) – When the United Nations General Assembly adopted a Resolution to declare 2016-2025 as the Third Industrial Development Decade for Africa (IDDA III) in August 2016, it stated: “Africa remains the poorest and the most vulnerable region in the world.” And this despite the two previous decades.

The Resolution A/RES/70/293 noted “the need for the continent to take urgent action to advance sustainable industrialization as a key element of furthering economic diversification and value addition, creating jobs and thus reducing poverty,” and contributing to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

OPINION2017-09-232023-07-10

Kazakhstan Plans a Summit of Nuclear Weapon States with an Eye on a Nuke-free World

By Kairat Abdrakhmanov, Kazakhstan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs

Following are extensive excerpts from Kazakhstan’s Foreign Minister Kairat Abdrakhmanov’s address to the United Nations General Assembly on September 21, 2017 in New York. He draws attention to President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s initiative “to convene a summit of all states possessing nuclear weapons to collectively discuss further steps towards their nuclear disarmament and attaining nuclear-weapon-free world,” and “to call for joint efforts to ensure that the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons enters into force by 2020,” the 50th anniversary of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons entering into force. – The Editor

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) – In his first statement at the United Nations in October 1992 President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev endorsed the concept of preventive diplomacy – the idea which is now very much highlighted by the Secretary-General and President of the General Assembly.

NEWSBRIEFS2017-09-222023-07-10

U.S. State Secretary Lauds Kazakh Decision to Renounce Nukes

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) – “The Republic of Kazakhstan is a particularly illustrative example of the wisdom of relinquishing nuclear weapons,” according to Rex W. Tillerson, the U.S. Secretary of State. He was addressing the United Nations Security Council Session on Nuclear Non-Proliferation on September 21, 2017.

“In partnership with the United States, and aided by the Cooperative Threat Reduction Act spearheaded by U.S. Senators Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar, Kazakhstan opted to remove from its territory former Soviet weapons and related nuclear technologies, and joined the Non-Proliferation Treaty as a non-weapons state,” Tillerson added.

OPINION2017-09-222023-07-10

The Threat of a Nuclear Attack Remains a Grim Reality

By Rex W. Tillerson, the U.S. Secretary of State

Following are extensive excerpts from remarks by the U.S. Secretary of State during the United Nations Security Council Session on Nuclear Non-Proliferation on September 21, 2017. The complete text is available on https://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2017/09/274362.htm – The Editor

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) – At a time when stabbings, crudely constructed bombs, and trucks driven into crowds of innocent men, women, and children are often our enemies’ weapons of choice to attack us, it is easy to become complacent and see the threat of nuclear attacks as a relic of the Cold War.

The threat of a nuclear attack remains a grim reality. Those who would trigger such a horrific scenario pose a unique threat to the security of peace-loving nations.

OPINION2017-09-212023-07-10

Trump Opted for Making the UN Great (Omitting the Word “Again”)

Viewpoint by Hugh Dugan*

The author is Visiting Scholar at Seton Hall University’s School of Diplomacy and former senior advisor to eleven U.S. ambassadors to the United Nations.

NEW YORK (IDN) – Many globalists feared last week the arrival of ‘Hurricane Donald’ unleashing its wrath on the United Nations at its annual opening session. In the end, it was downgraded to a tropical storm affecting only North Korea and Iran.

Trump’s tone and body language, which was all that his critics were prepared to dissect, were one with the script he revised up to the last minute. Much to their surprise, in fact he did not call to drain the UN swamp. And he opted against twitterizing the place as the “Deep UN”. Few came up with much to dislike, other than a few words meant to draw headlines.