UNESCO Courier articles from April 2001

UNESCO Courier archives from April 2001

Healing on the Playing Field
April 1, 2001... To youngsters in Liberia, football isn't just a game. It's the chance to forget a murderous civil war and dream of a better life, symbolized by the revered homeboy, "Mister George" George Weah has come a long way: from Monrovia, where he and his...

Violence in Schools: A World Wide Affair
April 1, 2001... ERIC DEBARBIEUX [1] In all countries, schools are magnets for strife in society. Dealing with these tensions calls for extreme caution, for fear of making matters worse Violence in schools is a worldwide problem: it exists in rich and poor...

Blame the System
April 1, 2001... Violence in schools of Francophone Africa doesn't come from the pupils, but from the system itself, says a Burkinabe expert Lord, I don't want to go to school any more. This "Prayer of a Small Black Child," written in the 1950s by the...

Karate-Trained Teachers Lose a Round
April 1, 2001... Unprecedented violence among young people is sweeping Japan. Some see it as a reaction to an earlier crackdown, but Yodji Morita, a sociologist from Osaka City University, criticizes the reliance on force Japanese society is facing what...

South Africa: Beyond Exclusion
April 1, 2001... During the apartheid era, township schools were sites of violent political struggle. Today, they are all too often at the mercy of criminal activity. The answers lie with society as a whole, not just the school Idealt drugs at school," "Pupil...

Lost in the Smoke of Time
April 1, 2001... The Vinales Valley, near the western tip of Cuba, is a magical landscape of hills and caves where life centres on growing tobacco. A Cuban writer recalls discovering this World Heritage site through books welt before setting foot there On the...

A Skewed Battle
April 1, 2001... DIRECTOR OF THE CAMBODIAN AUTHORITY FOR THE PROTECTION MANAGEMENT OF ANGKOR AND THE REGION OF SIEM REAP Everyone in Cambodia is aware that the Country's national heritage must be safeguarded. Financial and human resources, however, are...

"Indiana Jones Has No Future"
April 1, 2001... Even though the plundering goes on, a collector who purchases a piece with dubious provenance can no longer live with a clear conscience, says Lyndel Prott, director of Unesco's Cultural Heritage Division Owning stolen works will soon be as...

Stealing the Past from under Our Feet
April 1, 2001... Driven by an insatiable demand for artefacts, looters are all too often beating archaeologists to ancient sites and snatching our only chance to understand bygone cultures Because archaeologists don't know where it lies, a major Mayan city in...

Afghan Heritage: Time for Exile?
April 1, 2001... Despite unanimous indignation, the Taleban destroyed the statues of Bamiyan. The international community now has the responsibility to save what it still can On February 26, 2001, Mullah Omar, the Taleban's self-proclaimed emir, ordered the...

Mali: When Farmers Become Curators
April 1, 2001... For 20 years, Mali has been waging a war on the archaeological plundering that plagues the country. Everyone has followed the president to the front lines Today, the archaeological site of Jenne-Jeno is no longer looted. Not far from there,...

Homecoming for the Totem Poles
April 1, 2001... A spirit of mutual respect has grown between Native Americans and U.S. museums thanks to a law enabling tribes to repatriate the artefacts and remains of their distant ancestors On a cold afternoon a little more than a year ago, members of...

For That Stolen Vermeer, Follow the Art Squad
April 1, 2001... Italy was the first country to set up a special police squad to crack down on art trafficking. Its investigators go as far afield as Jamaica to pursue art traffickers, and serve as a model across Europe Each time we've found works abroad,...

The Proud Descendants of the Lord of Sipan
April 1, 2001... As the current guardian of the tomb of the Lord of Sipan -- the biggest archaeological find in Latin America in recent decades -- Peruvian archaeologist Walter Alva explains how the village of Lambayeque has profited from a treasure miraculously...

"We Have to Change the Buyer's Attitude"
April 1, 2001... Turkish investigative journalist Ozgen Acar has spent thirty years trailing art smugglers. His findings have brought prestigious foreign museums to court and treasures back home As a journalist, you have covered several art smuggling affairs....

Putting Embryos on the Assembly Line
April 1, 2001... By creating embryos through cloning, we may also find a treasure trove for treating disease. But in the rush to profit, we may sell short the very stuff that makes us human, a sense of dignity. A theoretical speck in a Petri dish has a...

Saving the Planet: Imperialism in a Green Garb?
April 1, 2001... Developing countries feel that protecting the world's resources is just another way for rich nations to retain the upper hand in the international trade game For nearly a decade, international efforts to address global environmental concerns...

"Getting to the Other's Shoes"
April 1, 2001... Ecuador's former environment minister Yolanda Kakabadse once said that "my heart is in conservation, but my head tells me I must be fair to my country." Today, as head of the World Conservation Union [*], she calls for a better understanding...

Africa: The Radio Scene Tells All
April 1, 2001... Radio, the most widely used medium in Africa, can only flourish on democratic soil, which helps to explain why private stations are thriving in the west and not in the centre of the continent Chad has only six private radio stations, while...

Cooking in a Crossfire
April 1, 2001... Alain Senderens, one of France's top chefs, creates dishes for a cosmopolitan elite, but worries that the dwindling of true homemade cooking is slowly killing off our tastebuds Is cuisine becoming globalized, like everything else? It's...