For A Change articles from December 1999

For A Change archives from December 1999

New millenniun, new beginnings?
December 1, 1999... As we turn the page and enter a new Millennium editorial writers everywhere will be expressing thoughts, visions of both gloom and utopia, exhortations and lamentations. What else is there to be said? Some of the most appropriate utterances...

Still no room at the inn? One in 264 people alive today has had to flee their home. While millions struggle in refugee camps, others bang on the doors of Western nations seeking asylum ...
December 1, 1999... In 1979 an 18-year-old Kurdish human rights campaigner, Fazil Kawani, fled to Britain from Iraq. That year 300 people applied for asylum in Britain. In the first eight months of 1999, 44,000 people did. Such figures put paid to any illusion...

Life in Sherkole refugee camp: five weeks in a refugee camp in Western Ethiopia shattered Fiona Leggat's sterotypes.
December 1, 1999... This summer I spent five weeks doing what millions do every day--I lived in a refugee camp. Unlike the 16,000 Sudanese refugees in Sherkole camp in Western Ethiopia, I had not come to seek shelter but as part of the UNHCR Camp Sadako Youth...

From the heart of Rwanda: (Didacienne tries to create a union in Rwanda).
December 1, 1999... On the forest paths around Mountain House, the MRA centre in Caux, Switzerland, you may find yourself taking a walk with a new friend and hearing an unexpected story. This is how it was for me with Didacienne, a striking young woman trade...

Russian's bridge to Estonia: (Violetta Sokolenko, a rector in Estonia).
December 1, 1999... One of the most important things in life is to know which bridges to cross and which to burn, says Violetta Sokolenko, Rector of the Tallinn Commercial College in Estonia. `Every day I try to burn the bridge which leads to fear.' When the...

Campaigner against dowry murders (broadcaster Jennifer Arul).
December 1, 1999... Media exposure could reduce dowry deaths--the murder of young brides whose families fail to give enough dowry to their husbands--and other incidents of sexual harassment in India, says the Indian broadcaster and campaigning journalist Jennifer...

Priest of many frontiers: Alan Channer meets Francois Ponchaud, the Catholic priest who brought the Cambodian genocide to the attention of the world.
December 1, 1999... The air was heavy with dust, exhaust fumes and the stench of drying fish. We were stuck in a Phnom Penh traffic jam close to a bridge over the Mekong river. Suddenly the driver saw a gap and tore down the inside lane, inadvertently splattering...

Learning to ask good questions: will the 21st century see as much human suffering as the 20th? Not if the graduates of the Caux Scholars Program have anything to do with it.
December 1, 1999... Sam Doe, a Liberian raised in poverty amidst the ravages of prolonged civil war, directs the West Africa Network for Peacebuilding, based in Accra, Ghana. Tanya Peric, a Bosnian whose father is Croatian and mother Serbian, was twice a refugee...

It all began at school: (Joseph Karanja is involved in cleaning up corruption in Kenya).
December 1, 1999... When Joseph Karanja started primary school in the small Kenyan town of Eldoret, at the age of seven, his hero was the retired Anglican Bishop Manasses Kuria. Karanja's secret ambition was to become a bishop like Kuria. What prevented...

First things first: family life is a juggling act these days, writes Catholic journalist, lecturer and mother Faustina Starrett.
December 1, 1999... There is no doubting the fact that family life, from the family of origin where we begin as children, to the family we create in the present, is what orientates us towards the future. It presents the profoundest and most far-reaching challenges...

Cool and moral campaign: (Clean Slate Campaign).
December 1, 1999... `The Clean Slate Campaign is a very good idea--personally I am not waiting for the year 2000--cleaning my own slate is a daily ongoing matter which I take seriously and try to carry out the cleaning with the help of the Lord "maker of heaven...

Following the heart.
December 1, 1999... Some people have too little time, others have too little to do. The company I was with closed in September 1997. Till then I had a good pay packet, a company car, a telephone and an annual vacation. Suddenly, for the first time, our family...

From workaholic to family man.
December 1, 1999... Driving to the office one Sunday morning I passed a church just as its bells started to ring. I stopped the car, asked myself what on earth I was doing with my life and instead of going to the office went to church. It did me a world of good....

Grandmother's dandelion seed: (Bina Gibson).
December 1, 1999... Bina Gibson was born in Berlin in 1920 and now lives in a quiet village in Devon, England. Her life embodies many of the struggles of this past century. Hers has been a journey of fears and faith, of joy and pain, of war and peace. This bold...

Gentleman of the road.
December 1, 1999... Just over 20 years ago when I was running a restaurant in London, we were visited now and again by a tramp. There was always a disturbance amongst the staff when he was seen coming up the steps. It was up to me as the person in charge to come...

Why East and West need each other: at a time when some are predicting increasing conflict between Western and Muslim nations, Abdul-Nabi Isstaif writes from Damascus with a call for partnership.
December 1, 1999... There is an Arabic proverb which reads: `Man is the enemy of that of which he is ignorant'. How can we remove this enmity from our lives? According to Arabic culture and society, the answer to this question seems obvious: the key which...

Rethink on news values.
December 1, 1999... Most Americans, according to polls, believe that the news media has gone too far in disclosing details of President Clinton's private life. They are also weary of the coverage and wish the whole thing would go away. Apart from the fact...

On a wing and a prayer.
December 1, 1999... The Egyptair flight to Cairo was preparing to take off. The emergency instructions had been given in English and were being given in Arabic. Then the tone of the Arabic changed, and I thought I caught the word `Allah'. I wondered whether the...

Where labels can be killers.
December 1, 1999... In the month after the single worst atrocity of `The Troubles', the Omagh bomb, the people of Northern Ireland showed their spirit of resilience and commitment to reconciliation. The fund for the victims--29 killed and over 220 injured--topped...