Europe

Dozens of organizations demonstrated this past Saturday, October 17, in Madrid, to demand the discontinuation of the project to reform immigration law. “We are protesting because this law sanctions discrimination against immigrants and signifies a violation of human rights,” proclaimed Sara Tajuelo, spokesperson for the Convergence of Cultures.

Participants of the World March make a silent vigil outside Northwood Headquarters, military headquarters facility of the British Armed Forces near London.
It is home to three command and control functions of the British armed forces and NATO; Permanent Joint Headquarters, Commander in Chief Fleet and the NATO Regional Command, Allied Maritime Component Command Northwood.

The Irish National Liberation Army (INLA), one of the most violent groups that took part in the Northern Ireland conflict, announced in a statement that “the armed struggle is over” and that from now on they will pursue their objectives through “exclusively peaceful political struggle”. The armed group murdered 113 people between 1975 and 2001.

This Friday, October 16th, marks the celebration World Food Day 2009, started and sponsored by the United Nations. This year’s theme “Achieving food security in times of crises” seeks to highlight the seriousness of the problems facing food supplies in the world, as well as the effects of biofuel production and climate change.

As Nobel Peace Laureates and Nobel Peace Laureate Organizations will meet on November 10th and 11th in Berlin, Germany, they are preparing the open letter we publish here in order that it can be signed by all individuals and organizations who agree on its content and on the concept that “Violence is a preventable disease”.

From October 8 to 11 the island of Rhodes (Greece) hosted the Seventh Annual Session of the World Public Forum, ‘Dialogue of Civilizations’. The World Center of Humanist Studies gave a talk on the theme of nonviolence as the only way out of the current crisis, presenting the World March for Peace and Nonviolence initiative.

The Nobel Peace prize to a president for rhetoric, with no real achievement, is like a peace prize for a movie to a former vice-president, with no real achievement either. People are touched by a rhetoric everybody has heard, but that it does not meet the criteria Nobel states in his will: understanding among nations, reduction of standing armies, and peace conferences.

One of the 2009 Right Livelihood Awards, also known as the Alternative Nobel Prizes goes to Alyn Ware, World March for Peace and Nonviolence Coordinator for New Zealand – Aotearoa, for “his effective and creative advocacy and initiatives over two decades to further peace education and to rid the world of nuclear weapons”.

US President Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday less than a year after he took office with the jury hailing his “extraordinary” diplomatic efforts on the international stage. The President said he was “both surprised and humbled” by the Nobel Committee’s decision. The decision is seen as an encouregement towards peace efforts in his nine months office.

A report produced by the humanitarian organizations Amnesty International, Oxfam, Greenpeace and Fundació per la Pau (Foundation for Peace) reveals that Spain is currently the sixth largest arms exporter, after the United States, Russia, Germany, France and England. According to the report, in 2008 Spain made 934 million Euros worth of defense material transactions.