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News for a Sustainable World, Peace and Security

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ARMAMENTS

Nagasaki Meet Recommends Concrete Steps For Nuke Abolition

By Ramesh Jaura* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis

BERLIN | NAGASAKI (IDN) – More than 50,000 nuclear weapons have been eliminated since the historic Reykjavík Summit between the then U.S. President Ronald Reagan and his counterpart from the erstwhile Soviet Union  Mikhail Gorbachev, which culminated into a groundbreaking Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in December 1987. But 17,300 nukes remain, threatening many times over the very survival of human civilization and most life on earth, as the 2013 Nagasaki Appeal points out.

The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) estimates that nine countries possess nuclear weapons: United States (7,700 warheads), Russia (8,500), Britain (225), France (300), China (250), Israel (80), India (between 90 and 110), Pakistan (between 100 and 120) and North Korea (10).

ENERGY

Huge Global Post-Harvest Losses Are Avoidable

By Bruce H. Rubin* | IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint

LANSDALE, Pennsylvania (IDN) – In today’s world of growing populations and food needs, we are revisiting, with respect to agriculture, the old adage “Give a man a fish and he eats for a day; teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime.” However, too often in the developing world, we are letting the newly-educated man down by not providing him with infrastructure needed to save, sell, or transport what he grows.

India, Africa, Latin America and other developing regions continue to face crippling hunger and poverty rates. Despite the consistent production of agricultural products, the post-harvest loss rate for fruits and vegetables hovers around 40% and has remained there for years, undermining the ability of local farmers to feed their countrymen and develop exports. The total spoilage of post-harvest loss hovers around 1.3 billion tons.

Renewables

Renewable Energy Can Pave the Path to Peace

By Hélène Connor-Lajambe* | IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint

PARIS – The United Nations and other world agencies are geographically global in scope, but seldom seem able to work together on the same issue, however crucial it is, even when deep misery or armed conflicts ensue.

Climate change is the best example of the silo mentality within our highest institutions and most of our societies. It is only lately, for instance, that the World Bank has started to reconsider its funding of coal plants, and the International Energy Agency is at last making waves as it promotes energy efficiency while other agencies are still pushing the search for more oil reserves.

ARMAMENTS

Umbrella States Should Quit Nuke Dependency

By Leo Hoffmann-Axthelm* | IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint

BERLIN (IDN | ICAN) – In addition to the nine nuclear-armed states, there are five NATO states with nuclear weapons on their soil. 24 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey still host forward-deployed US B-61 thermonuclear gravity bombs.

They offer zero military value – in fact, the fighter jets that are responsible for carrying and dropping these bombs, should such an order be given, are barely able to leave EU territory without refueling. Most NATO-states are opposed to nuclear sharing, a dangerous relic of the cold war.

Middle East

Iran Talks: France Anxious About Competition With the Other Five

By Jaya Ramachandran | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis

BERLIN | TEHRAN (IDN) – France is concerned about its declining influence in the Middle East and fears economic competition from the U.S., Britain and Germany if relations between Tehran and the West are normalized for the first time since the 1979 Iranian revolution. This, according to a senior Iranian analyst, is the reason French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius appeared to adopt a tough stance in Iran’s talks with the P5+1 – the UN Security Council’s permanent members, the U.S., Britain, France, Russia, China along with Germany – on November 9-10 in Geneva.

GLOBAL ISSUES

Iran Talks: France Anxious About Competition With the Other Five

By Jaya Ramachandran | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis

BERLIN | TEHRAN (IDN) – France is concerned about its declining influence in the Middle East and fears economic competition from the U.S., Britain and Germany if relations between Tehran and the West are normalized for the first time since the 1979 Iranian revolution. This, according to a senior Iranian analyst, is the reason French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius appeared to adopt a tough stance in Iran’s talks with the P5+1 – the UN Security Council’s permanent members, the U.S., Britain, France, Russia, China along with Germany – on November 9-10 in Geneva.

Europe

Whither Post-Wall Europe – and Germany?

By Ramesh Jaura | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis

BERLIN (IDN) – Europe is the world’s richest region. Together 28 countries constituting the European Union (EU) are the world’s largest market. EU and its member states provide 56% of about $130 billion global official development assistance. Precisely this obliges Europe not to stay bogged down in ongoing financial and identity crises but accept its international responsibilities wholeheartedly.

This was the upshot of a landmark speech by the European Council President Herman Van Rompuy on November 9, the very day the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, 28 years after it was erected to reinforce post-war division of Germany and Europe. The day was “perhaps the most important tipping point, not just for Germany but in our recent European history,” he said.

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