Mass Demostrations for Peace in Ireland

The first terrorist murder of a PSNI officer has led to an unprecedented wave of condemnation and a widespread rejection of the terror that criminal splinter groups are trying to bring to the British-ruled Six Counties of Ulster once again.

Tens of thousands of people have joined peace rallies in the North of Ireland today, in protest against the brutal killings of a local policeman in Co. Armagh on Monday and two British soldiers in Co. Antrim last Saturday.

Separate rallies were held in Belfast, Lisburn, Newry, Downpatrick and Derry, showing solidarity for peace in Ireland and condemnation of the two deadly attacks for which two terrorist splinter groups have claimed responsibility.

In Belfast traffic in the streets around the City Hall was brought to a standstill as thousands of people gathered for a rally organised by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU).
The protesters observed a couple of minutes' silence and a lone piper played 'Amazing Grace' and 'Abide with me'.

"The callous attacks of the last few days were an assault on every citizen who supports peace," ICTU's assistant general secretary Peter Bunting told the crowd.
“This show of strength from civil society will send a clear message to the killers who do not deserve the monopoly of the word ‘dissident’. The word is too good for them. They are nothing but delinquents.”

Several speakers from the Irish Trade Union movement addressed the gatherings in the other cities.

Meanwhile this afternoon in London about two dozen British MPs from various parties stood in silence outside the Houses of Parliament in solidarity with those who have been taking part in protest marches and silent vigils against the killings in the North of Ireland .
The Republic of Ireland was represented at this event by the Charge d'Affaires at our London embassy, Mr. Kevin Conmy.

Tonight more than 500 local people gathered for a silent vigil in Craigavon, Co. Armagh close to the spot where PSNI Constable Stephen Carroll was shot dead by terrorists on Monday evening.

Earlier today Pope Benedict XVI also condemned the recent violence in Ireland in a speech at the Vatican.
"I condemn in the strongest terms these abominable acts of terrorism which, apart from desecrating human life, seriously endanger the ongoing peace process in Northern Ireland," the Pontiff said during his weekly general audience.
"I ask the Lord that no one will again give in to the horrendous temptation of violence," he added.

In a separate development, the historian and senior Sinn Féin politician Tom Hartley (right), currently the Lord Mayor of Belfast, is having talks with members of the Unionist Ulster Political Research Group, which has links to loyalist paramilitary groups in the Ulster Defence Association (UDA).

2008 Nobel Prize for Peace

The 2008 Nobel Prize for Peace has been awarded to Martti Ahtisaari, former President of Finland, diplomat and international negotiator, "for his important efforts, on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts".

Martti Oiva Kalevi Ahtisaari was born on June 23rd, 1937 in Viipuri / Finland, where his father Oiva was a non-commissioned officer in the service corps.
Oiva Ahtisaari, whose grandfather had emigrated to Finland from southern Norway, took Finnish citizenship in 1929 and changed his surname from Adolfsen to Ahtisaari in 1935.
The war took Martti's father to the front as a military mechanic, while his mother Tyyne moved with her son to Kuopio to escape immediate danger. Kuopio was where Martti spent most of his childhood and first attended school.

In 1952 the family moved to Oulu and Martti Ahtisaari joined the local YMCA. After completing his military service (Ahtisaari still holds the rank of Captain in the Finnish Army Reserve) he began to study through a distance-learning course at the teachers' college in Oulu. Thus he was able to live at home while attending the two-year course, which qualified him as a primary school teacher in 1959. He also was an avid student of foreign languages, and besides his native tongue he also speaks Swedish, French, English and German.

In 1960 Martti Ahtisaari moved to Karachi in Pakistan, to lead the YMCA's physical education training establishment there. During this time he became accustomed to a more international environment. As well as managing the students' home, the job involved also the training of teachers, which in itself suited him well.
He returned to Finland in 1963 and attended the Helsinki Polytechnic Institute. He was also active in organisations responsible for aid to developing countries and joined AIESEC, the world's largest organisation of university students.

In 1965 Martti Ahtisaari joined Finland's Ministry for Foreign Affairs. He first served in the Bureau for International Development Aid, eventually becoming the assistant head of that department. Later Ahtisaari transferred to the diplomatic service and held a number of embassy posts, mostly in Africa. After several promotions he became Finland's Ambassador to Tanzania, Zambia, Somalia and Mozambique.

Following the death of the UN Commissioner for Namibia, Bernt Carlsson, on Pan Am Flight 103 (which exploded due to a bomb on board over the Scottish town of Lockerbie) on December 21th, 1988, Ahtisaari was sent to Namibia in April 1989 as the UN Special Representative to head the United Nations Transition Assistance Group (UNTAG).
After completing this task, he became a member of the council that was seeking a peaceful settlement of the civil war in Bosnia.

He was still in this position, when Finland's Social Democratic Party asked him to become their candidate for the upcoming presidential election. After a change of the Constitution the President of Finland was directly elected by the people for the first time in 1993 (previously an electoral college made that decision) and thus the party was looking for a candidate without political baggage.
Ahtisaari accepted the candidacy and his politically untarnished image was a major factor in the election, as was his vision of Finland as an active participant in international affairs.

He narrowly won the election in the second round, beating his opponent Elisabeth Rehn of the Swedish People's Party, and served as Finland's first directly elected head of state from March 1994 to March 2000.

His term as President began with a schism in the Centre Party government, led by Prime Minister Esko Aho, who did not approve of Ahtisaari's active involvement in foreign policy. There was also some controversy over Ahtisaari's speaking out on domestic issues, such as unemployment.
He travelled extensively in Finland and abroad and was nicknamed 'Matka-Mara' (Travel-Mara).
His monthly travels throughout the country and his meetings with ordinary citizens - the so-called maakuntamatkat (provincial trips) - greatly enhanced his political popularity.

As President Martti Ahtisaari supported Finland's entry into the European Union, and in a referendum in 1994 a majority of 56% of Finnish voters were in favour of membership.

Following his invitation, Boris Yeltsin and Bill Clinton met in Helsinki. He also negotiated alongside Viktor Chernomyrdin with Slobodan Milošević to end the fighting in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo in 1999.

Often encountering resistance from the Finnish parliament, which preferred a more cautious foreign policy, as well as criticism from within his own party, Martti Ahtisaari did not seek re-election in 2000.
He was succeeded by the foreign minister Tarja Halonen, who became the first female President of Finland and is still the incumbent, now in her second term.

Since leaving office, Martti Ahtisaari accepted positions in various international organisations and founded the Crisis Management Initiative (CMI), an independent non-governmental organisation with a goal in developing and sustaining peace in troubled areas.

In 2000 and 2001 he came to the North of Ireland and - together with Cyril Ramaphosa of the ANC - inspected IRA weapons dumps for the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning (under the Canadian General John de Chastelain) as part of the Northern Ireland peace process.

In 2005 Ahtisaari successfully led peace negotiations between the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) and the Indonesian government through his non-governmental organization CMI. The negotiations ended on August 15th, 2005 with a treaty on disarmament of GAM rebels, the dropping of GAM demands for an independent state of Aceh, and withdrawal of non-organic Indonesian forces.

In November 2005 UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan appointed Martti Ahtisaari as Special Envoy for the Kosovo status process, which was to determine whether Kosovo should become independent or remain a province of Serbia. (Kosovo had been administered by the United Nations since the 1999 Kosovo War.)
Ahtisaari opened his UN Office (UNOSEK) in Vienna, from where he conducted the Kosovo status negotiations.
Those opposed to Ahtisaari's settlement proposal, which involved an internationally-monitored independence for Kosovo, sought to discredit him. Allegations made by Balkan media sources of corruption and improper conduct were described by US State Department spokesman Tom Casey as "spurious", adding that Ahtisaari's plan is the "best solution possible" and has "the full endorsement of the United States".

However, in July 2007, when the EU, Russia and the USA agreed to find a new format for the talks, Ahtisaari announced that he regarded his mission as over.
After a period of great uncertainty and mounting tension Kosovo unilaterally declared its independence from Serbia in February 2008. (see my entry from March 1st)

Ahtisaari strongly defended the actions of US in the crisis that preceded the current war in Iraq. After the war had started, Ahtisaari said: "Since I know that about a million people have been killed by the government of Iraq, I do not need much those weapons of mass destruction". (Iraq's - non-existent -weapons of mass destruction were the primary reason the USA gave to justify the attack.)

Finnish intellectuals and the professor of history Juha Sihvola, who thinks the current war in Iraq is not justified, criticised Ahtisaari's conclusions about the morality of the war, saying that they were "astounding".

And Johan Galtung, the Norwegian founder of peace studies, also criticised heavily Ahtisaari's way of handling peace processes. Galtung claims that "Ahtisaari does not solve conflicts, but drives through short-term solutions that please western countries". He further says that Ahtisaari "lets the EU make use of him". According to Galtung, "Ahtisaari does not hesitate to favour solutions that bypass the United Nations and international law".

On the other hand, the Prime Minister of Finland Matti Vanhanen said that Ahtisaari has been "very determined in his peace negotiations" and that results are only achieved when peace processes are being moved ahead determinedly.

It is not unusual to hear and read such different statements. No-one who stands in the limelight of international politics has only friends or only enemies. People always takes sides, and have their own views, assessments and opinions.

The Nobel Committee in Oslo, which awards the Prize for Peace (while all the other Nobel Prizes are awarded by the Swedish Academy in Stockholm) must have weighed the different arguments and opinions of Martti Ahtisaari before they made their decision. They have found him worthy of the 2008 Nobel Prize for Peace, and he is certainly a worthy recipient.

Furthermore, the prize will help the work of the Crisis Management Initiative (CMI), the organisation Martti Ahtisaari founded and uses for his peace negotiations.
The 71-year-old, who is married and has one son, is in good health and will certainly be strengthened and inspired to further initiatives by receiving this high international honour.

Having met him once briefly in Belfast, when he was here as member of the Decommissioning Board, I remember a man with determination, strength and will power, who is nevertheless very polite, speaks softly and has a certain charisma. And whatever his critics say about his work in Kosovo, for Ireland he has done a lot of good. With our thanks for that we combine our heartfelt congratulations and wish him good health and further success for many years to come.

The Emerald Islander

40 Years ago: Martin Luther King assassinated

40 years ago the most important, effective and charismatic leader of the American civil rights movement died from an assassin's bullet.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (left), who had been awarded the 1964 Nobel Prize for Peace in recognition of his long and peaceful work for civil and equal rights in the USA, did inspire a whole generation of Americans, regardless of their colour, and changed the social structure and politics of the United States for ever. His strong ideas and charismatic personality made him popular all around the world, and he is now regarded as one of the great men of the 20th century.

Born as Michael King, Jr. on January 15th, 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia, he became Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1935, when his father - a Baptist preacher - changed both his and his son's given name. His first encounter with a large crowd was in 1939, when the ten-year-old sang in a choir celebrating the Atlanta première of the famous film "Gone with the Wind".

In 1944 - aged 15 - King entered Morehouse College and after skipping two years he graduated in 1948 with a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) degree in Sociology. The next three years he spent at Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, from where he graduated with a Bachelor of Divinity (B.D.) degree in 1951.
In September of the same year he began doctoral studies in Systematic Theology at Boston University.
1953 King became pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, and on June 5th, 1955 he received his Doctorate in Philosophy (Ph.D.) in Boston.

Soon afterwards King became known to a wider audience when he got involved in the Montgomery Bus Boycott. On December 1st, 1955 Rosa Parks, a black woman, was arrested for refusing to comply with US laws that required her to give up her bus seat to a white man. The black people of Montgomery felt that things had gone too far, and assisted by the trade union leader E. D. Nixon, King organised a city-wide bus boycott. It lasted for 385 days, and during that time the situation became so tense that King's house was bombed by white supremacists. King himself was also arrested during the campaign, which only ended when a US District Court ended racial segregation on all Montgomery public buses.

King was instrumental in the founding of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in 1957, a group created to harness the moral authority and organising power of black churches to conduct non-violent protests in the service of civil rights reform. He continued to dominate the organization for the rest of his life.

King was an adherent of the philosophies of non-violent civil disobedience as described in Henry David Thoreau's essay of the same name, and used successfully in India by Mohandas K. "Mahatma" Gandhi.
King applied this philosophy to the protests organized by the SCLC. In 1958, while signing copies of his book "Strive Toward Freedom" in a Harlem store, he was stabbed in the chest with a letter opener by a deranged black woman and only narrowly escaped death.

Representing the SCLC, Martin Luther King, was among the leaders of the so-called "Big Six" civil rights organizations who were instrumental in the organization of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963.
President John F. Kennedy initially opposed the march, because he was concerned it would negatively impact the drive for passage of civil rights legislation. But King and the other organisers were firm that the march would proceed.

The march made several specific demands: an end to racial segregation in public school; meaningful civil rights legislation, including a law prohibiting racial discrimination in employment; protection of civil rights workers from police brutality; a $ 2 minimum wage for all workers; and self-government for the District of Columbia, then governed by a congressional committee.

Despite tensions, the march was a resounding success. More than 250,000 people of diverse ethnicities attended, sprawling from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial onto the National Mall and around the reflecting pool. At the time, it was the largest gathering of protesters in the history of the US capital. And King's by now world-famous "I Have a Dream" speech electrified the crowd. It is regarded, along with Abraham Lincoln's "Gettysburg Address", one of the finest speeches in American oratory.

Throughout his career, King wrote and spoke frequently, drawing on his experience as a preacher. His "Letter from Birmingham Jail", written in 1963, is a passionate statement of his Crusade for Justice.
On October 14th, 1964 he became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, which was awarded to him for leading non-violent resistance to end racial prejudice in the United States.

In 1965 King began to express serious doubts about the United States' role in Vietnam. On April 4th, 1967 - to the day exactly one year before his death - King delivered his "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence" at the New York City Riverside Church. He spoke strongly against American participation in the war, insisting that the US was in Vietnam "to occupy it as an American colony" and calling the US government "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today." *1

He often claimed that North Vietnam "did not begin to send in any large number of supplies or men until American forces had arrived in the tens of thousands" in South Vietnam. King also praised North Vietnam's land reform. He accused the USA of having killed a million Vietnamese, "mostly children". *2

King had long been hated by many of the radical white southern segregationists, but this speech turned the more mainstream media against him as well.
TIME magazine called the speech "demagogic slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi", and The Washington Post declared that King had "diminished his usefulness to his cause, his country, his people".

On March 30th, 1968, King went to Memphis, Tennessee in support of the black public works employees, who had been on strike since March 12th for higher wages and better treatment. On April 3rd, he returned to Memphis for another rally. And as always when he visited the city, he stayed in the same place, the Lorraine Motel (pictured above right). In fact, King was such a creature of habit that he usually stayed in the very same Room - No. 306. This was no secret and common knowledge all around Memphis.

His last public speech was delivered that day at the Mason Temple, and it was later seen as somehow visionary, as if King had foreseen his own death in a recent dream. He said: "I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord." *3

The next day, April 4th, King took some fresh air on the balcony of his motel room. According to an official report a single bullet hit him at 6.01 p.m., entering the body through the right cheek, smashing his jaw and then travelling down his spinal cord before lodging in his shoulder. Several close friends of King were present and witnessed the murder, including two well-known black preachers, civil rights campaigners and politicians who later carried on their dead friend's work. They were Ralph Abernathy and Jesse Jackson.
King was rushed to St. Joseph's Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 7.05 p.m.

When the news of the assassination spread, there were angry demonstrations and spontaneous riots in more than 100 cities all over the USA.
In Illinois - the home state of the first assassinated President Abraham Lincoln - Senator Robert F. Kennedy was due to address a predominantly black crowd during his own campaign for the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party. Minutes before the speech Kennedy had heard the news and then addressed the people in an exemplary way. Speaking six minutes without a script or preparation, he spoke from the heart. The people of Illinois understood him and went home grieving and angry over the murder, but they remained peaceful. *4

Despite the fact that two months after the murder an escaped US convict - James Earl Ray - was arrested at London's Heathrow Airport and rather easily confessed to the murder, days later he retracted his statement and insisted ever since that he was not Martin Luther King's murderer. Nevertheless he was sentenced to 99 years jail and died in prison in 1998.
But there is plenty of evidence that the assassination of Martin Luther King was the result of an elaborate conspiracy, involving government agencies, along the same lines as the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and his brother, Senator Robert F. Kennedy.

There is not enough space here to outline the whole background, but there are plenty of websites and other sources available to enlighten you further.
The latest sensational revelation came six years ago, when the New York Times reported that a church minister, Ronald Denton Wilson, claimed his father, Henry Clay Wilson - and not James Earl Ray - assassinated Martin Luther King, Jr.
Given the secretive ways of the USA and its extremely right-wing policies, it is doubtful that we will ever have a satisfactory and official explanation of what really happened.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is missed today by the decent people of this world just as much as he was missed and mourned 40 years ago. It appears that for the majority of Americans violence - including murder, war crimes, assassination and torture - is still acceptable and even "normal". As long as this is the case, things will go from bad to worse. Let me close with a word from the New Testament, which Martin Luther King knew so well: "Those who live by the sword shall perish by the sword." This will be the future of the USA, unless some drastic change for good takes place - and takes place soon.

The Emerald Islander

Footnotes:
* 1 Well, nothing has changed since, except the countries the USA occupies as modern colonies. In place of Vietnam and Cambodia they have now Iraq and Afghanistan.
* 2 This is an interesting number, especially during the late 1960s, before the interest of international organisations was drawn closely to monitor Vietnam and Cambodia. But figures from this time are difficult to verify, since the USA never even bother counting local civilian casualties. They still have the same inhumane (but very convenient for the White House) practice today in Iraq and Afghanistan.
* 3 The last sentence is a direct quote from the "Battle Hymn of the Republic", a song popular with the Union troops during the Civil War (1861-65).
* 4 Tragically 63 days later Senator Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated himself in Los Angeles. It appears that even after two centuries as a sovereign nation the USA were still struggling to join the civilised world, where open murder and political assassinations do simply not happen. Sadly, the conditions in the United States today are much worse than they were in 1968, although now most leading politicians are guarded and protected so massively that it is near to impossible for ordinary people to meet them.