OPINION

Collage of the mass grave at the Killing Field of Choeung Ek with the leader of the Killing Fields on the left. Source: Wikimedia.

Death of The Leader Of "The Killing Fields" Raises Questions

Will there be more genocides that the world will ignore until it is too late?

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power*

LUND, Sweden (IDN) – One of the cruellest men ever to have lived died on September 2 in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. Kaing Guek Eav, popularly known as “Duch”, was 77 and had been convicted of mass torture by the UN/Cambodian war crimes court. He was the only one of the five defendants to admit his crimes. In July 2010 in a trial I witnessed first-hand he was sentenced to life imprisonment.

According to Seth Mydans, the New York Times’s correspondent in Cambodia at the time of the rule of Pol Pot who founded the guerrilla movement, the Khmer Rouge, “he was a schoolteacher before the Khmer Rouge came to power. He took his revolutionary name from a children’s book about an obedient schoolboy named Duch. ‘I wanted to be a well-disciplined boy who respected the teachers and did good deeds’, he told the court.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 08 September 2020

Photo: The name "United Nations", coined by United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt was first used in the Declaration by United Nations of 1 January 1942, during the Second World War, when representatives of 26 nations pledged their Governments to continue fighting together against the Axis Powers. Source: UN

Will the United Nations Survive To See Its 100th Birthday?

Viewpoints by Franz Baumann, Fmr. UN Assistant Secretary-General, United Nations and Christopher Ankersen, Global Affairs, New York University.

NEW YORK (IDN) – "Adlai Stevenson, President Kennedy’s Ambassador to the United Nations, rebutted UN critics by recounting Adam's marriage proposal to Eve. When she hesitated, Adam asked 'is there somebody else?' Stevenson concluded that much good had been done, also some harm, but there was nothing else. That was then," recalls Dr Franz Baumann, and adds: "What about now?"

The following is the first of two rounds of Dr Baumann's stimulating exchange with Dr Chris Ankersen posted on PAIRAGRAPH – A Hub of discourse between pairs of notable individuals. The second round will be launched in the next days also on the link: https://pairagraph.com/dialogue/f47ba870e06d4df2b0cccef483592d82.

: UN Bureau; UN INSIDER; 08 September 2020

Photo credit: Flickr/Paul Stein.CC BY-SA 2.0

History Gives Us Reason for Hope That Inequality Can Be Beaten

Viewpoint by Ben Phillips*

This article was originally published on openDemocracy. Any views or opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of IDN-InDepth News.

LONDON (IDN) – 2020 isn’t just the year of the Covid-19 pandemic. It’s also the year when protest has gone viral. Covid-19 has both supercharged our inequalities and shone a sharper light on them, exposing the reality that the status quo cannot hold. It has opened up a moment of opportunity, and young people are showing how we can seize that moment by building up a movement.

: Phil Harris; OPINION; 07 September 2020

Photo: President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump, are joined by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, and his wife, Mrs. Akie Abe, as they pose for photos Saturday, Feb. 11, 2017, at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, FL. (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)

Japan's Longest-Serving Prime Minister Failed to Achieve Most of His Goals

Viewpoint by Sven Saaler

The writer is representative of the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung in Japan and Professor of Modern Japanese History at Sophia University in Tokyo. This article appeared the web-based International Politics and Society Journal on September 3.

TOKYO (IDN) – On 28 August 2020, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced that he would be stepping down after a record term in office of almost eight years. Abe had already been Prime Minister between 2006 and 2007. In his first term of office, he had been barely able to move anything forward and was described in the media as ‘a complete failure’.

: Asia Editor; OPINION; 06 September 2020

Photo: Sustainable agriculture and women’s and youth empowerment are two of the top priorities of HAF. Source: HAF

A Generation and a Day in Development Life – HAF Celebrates 20 Years

Viewpoint by Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir

The writer is President of the High Atlas Foundation in Marrakech, Morocco.

MARRAKECH (IDN) – As so many of us ask when we commemorate an anniversary of decades: where have all the years gone? Have we done all we can? Have we been of true service? Did we do right?

We also may wonder on these occasions what might the future hold. Will our dreams – our Moroccan dreams – come true? Will every village and neighbourhood come together, with every young person, every elderly, every woman and a man from all circumstances and be part of designing and deciding the future course of their community? And will the High Atlas Foundation (HAF) be of the best service it could as the Moroccan people create the change they seek?

: Africa & ME Editor; OPINION; 05 September 2020

Photo: UN ESCAP Executive Secretary Ms Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana against the backdrop of web slider Regional Conversation Series on Building Back Better. Collage IDN-INPS

Financing Economic Recovery in The Midst Of COVID-19

Viewpoint by Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana

The writer is the United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

BANGKOK (IDN) – As the socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic spread across the length and breadth of Asia and the Pacific, finance ministries are continuing their relentless efforts to inject trillions of dollars for emergency health responses and fiscal packages. With continued lockdown measures and restricted borders, economic rebound seems uncertain.

: Asia Editor; OPINION; 05 September 2020

Photo: Participants at the Non-Governmental Organizations Forum meeting held in Huairou, China, as part of the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing, China on 4-15 September 1995. UN Photo/Milton Grant

Let us draw on the activist spirit of the Beijing Conference on Women

By Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka

The writer is UN Women Executive Director. The following is her statement for the 25th anniversary of the opening of the Fourth World Conference on Women on September 4, 1995.

NEW YORK (IDN) – Exactly 25 years after the opening of the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, China, its significance is undimmed. In that quarter century we have seen the strength and impact of collective activism grow and have been reminded of the importance of multilateralism and partnership to find common solutions to shared problems.

: UN Bureau; OPINION; 04 September 2020

What Happens to the Plastic the UK Recycles?

Viewpoint by Regina Frei & Diego Vazquez-Brust*

SOUTHAMPTON | PORTSMOUTH, United Kingdom (IDN) – The secretive way in which plastic recycling is handled in the UK carries the potential for the next big scandal. While the government’s statutory guidance is supposed to clarify who is responsible, our research suggests that what happens to plastics we believe to be recycled in the UK is in reality quite obscure.

Each council in the UK contracts different companies for the disposal and recycling of household waste, so the rules for residents in different areas vary. But you probably separate recyclables before filling your recycling bin and expect that waste (except when it’s black) to be recycled.

: Phil Harris; OPINION; 04 September 2020

Collage of pictures of classic Nigerian Jollof rice from Food 52 (left) and Unrest over the deportation of 723 Nigerians living in Ghana from African Liberty, March 6, 2019.

Food, President and Things We Don't Like About Ghana

Viewpoint by Azu Ishiekwene

The writer is the Managing Director/Editor-In-Chief of The Interview magazine based in Abuja, Nigeria.

ABUJA (IDN) – Three years ago, it was a war spiced with condiments and paste over a dish of grain. Nigeria’s Information Minister Lai Mohammed was answering a question by CNN’s Richard Quest about who makes the tastiest jollof rice in West Africa.

But Mohammed heard the question wrong. He thought Quest’s question was about the origin of jollof rice and answered Senegal. The minister had scarcely finished answering when social media began to steam over the mistaken answer that Senegalese jollof rice was tastier than Nigeria’s. The avatars treated it as nothing less than culinary high treason.

: Opinion Editor; OPINION; 03 September 2020

Photo: Eminent political analyst, writer and former Special Envoy Abukar Arman. Source: Middle East Monitor, May 30, 2015

Somalia Remains the Epicentre of Global Geopolitical and Geo-Economic Competition

Kester Kenn Klomegah* talks to a Former Somali Diplomat Abukar Arman

MOSCOW (IDN) – Though Somalia is coveted for its strategic location and huge marine resources, it remains one of the largely unstable and underdeveloped countries in Africa. With its longest coastline, bordering Ethiopia to the west, Kenya to the southwest and the Gulf of Eden, it has attracted many foreign countries to the region.

Over the years, Somalia has been in quest of political stability, peaceful investment environment and sustainable development. There have been attempts to help the country establish its political institutions and structure political power. In 1991, for instance, a multi-phased international conference on Somalia was held in neighbouring Djibouti.