New Internationalist articles from May 2003

New Internationalist archives from May 2003

From this month's designer.(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... BUENOS AIRES, January. Half a world away powerful gear for war, here the economy is in tatters -- but as South Americans from Guevara to Galeano would tell you, there's always time for football. So I left David, the editor of this magazine,...

Letters.(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2003... Only child The New Internationlist welcomes your letters, But please keep them short. They may be edited for purposes of space or clarity. Letters should be sent to letters@newint.org or to your local NI office. Please remember to include...

In memory of Iraq.
May 1, 2003... For many years Felicity Arbuthnot has written and campaigned about the impact of war and sanctions on the people of Iraq. One of the last visitors to leave Baghdad before war began, she remembers the buildings, great and small, now being...

Where next? We are in danger of entering a new age of 'disarmament' wars led by an aggressive, unilateralist US. The NI reports on some of the right-wing thinkers behind US foreign policy, and considers their possible next targets. (Currents).
May 1, 2003... NEO-C0NSERVATIVE hawks in the US take the view that the invasion of Iraq is only the first step in a wider conquest of the Middle East. Michael Leeden, of influential right-wing thinktank the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), said on 19...

The forgotten famine: Africa's hungry are being ignored. (Aid).(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... 'How is it that we routinely accept a level of suffering and hopelessness in Africa that we would never accept in any other part of the world?' asked James Morris, executive director of the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) as the UN Security...

Vaginas and violence. (Aid).(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... In conservative Kenya where a woman can be stripped naked in public for wearing a mini-skirt decent people do not talk about vaginas. Enter Mumbi Kaigwa, Kenya's feted actress, producer and director, with a daring dream to stage Eve...

Seriously... you couldn't make this stuff up. (Aid).(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... When is a terrorist not a terrorist? When he's a Cuban-American, possibly. Rogue State author William Blum recently asked: 'What do you call a man who blows up a plane killing 73 people... who attempts assassinations against several...

The liberation of Latin America: Latin Americans are voting for radical change--but can they find freedom? (Latin America: Introduction).
May 1, 2003... ANOTHER world isn't just possible -- it looks rather like this. Dozens of food cooperatives surround a sea of tables and a cacophony of debate in every language under the sun. We have just escaped from the sweltering Gigantinho ('Little Giant')...

I am the other: from the rubble of a collapsed society in Argentina the voices of its people can still be heard loud and clear. David Ransom went to Buenos Aires to listen. (Latin America: Argentina - Social Movements).
May 1, 2003... 'LOOKED at from the outside, it's pretty chaotic,' says Hebe de Bonafini. 'A useless Government, completely dependent on the International Monetary Fund. There's no work. Children have been dying of hunger for a long time, though this has only...

The tick and the time bomb. (Latin America: Venezuela - Democracy).
May 1, 2003... In oil-rich Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez has added his 'Bolivarian Revolution' to an explosive mix. Michael McCaughan examines what might prove to be a test-bed for the destruction of democratic regimes elsewhere in Latin America ...

Latin America & the Caribbean the facts.
May 1, 2003... Liberation may be on its way - but there's a long was to go. Environment New movements are tacking common environmental issues in Latin America - they have a lot do. (4) * Between 1972 and 2000 the urban population rose from 58.9%...

Longing for Lula: the election of 'Lula' da Silva as President is a turning point in Brazilian history--but Sue Branford is worried about the destination. (Latin America: Brazil - The Debt Crisis).
May 1, 2003... 'To end hunger in the country. That's what I want President Lula to do,' said the 19-year-old woman, Marina, looking at me very seriously with her dark-brown eyes. 'I voted for Lula. He cares for people and he's determined to do something for...

Sound of the soul: Bolivia may lead a Latin American rebellion against the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). (Latin America: Bolivia - Trade).
May 1, 2003... IN the eyes of Bolivia's elite, South America's poorest nation might as well drop off the edge of the planet if it opts out of the forthcoming economic marriage of the hemisphere -- the FTAA. A rising wave of opinion here, however, takes a...

Enough already: on 1 January 2004 it will be 10 years since Mexico joined the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)--and the Zapatista uprising began in Chiapas. (Latin Dimension).(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... If any country in Latin America stood to gain from a trade agreement with the US it was Mexico, with its common border offering ease of transport and attractive opportunities for US investors. NAFTA has indeed benefited some groups within...

The divided states of Latin America. (Latin America: History).
May 1, 2003... History, culture and poverty unite as well as divide the peoples of Latin America. But their diversity has been exploited to promote division rather than solidarity, uniformity rather than unity. Origins The two great empires, Aztec in...

Under the umbrella: Roberto Elissalde charts the rise of the Frente Amplio, a 'broad front' of Left groups in Uruguay. (Latin America: Uruguay - The Politics of The Left).(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... IN February 2003 Tabare Vazquez, presidential candidate of the Frente Amplio in Uruguay and clear favourite to win elections in 2005, met with officials of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Inter American Development Bank and the World...

Growing from the grassroots. (Latin America: Ecuador - Indigenous Movements).
May 1, 2003... Pachakutik, a new alliance of indigenous people with the urban and rural poor, is now part of the Government in Ecuador. Luis Angel Saavedra explains the background -- and the dilemmas an increasingly prominent indigenous movement now faces....

Narendra Damodardas Modi. (Worldbeaters).(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... On the election trail he was at his crude best, combining gutter politics with a tirade of hate. He cast himself as the only one who could prevent Muslim wrath from boomeranging on the state. Asked what could be done for the Muslims rendered...

Her Sister's Eye. (Mixed Media).
May 1, 2003... by Vivienne Cleven (University of Queensland Press. ISBN 0 7022 32831) The Australian outback town of Mundra is plagued by its history of disappearances and suspicion. Its streets echo with rumours of murder and atrocities, and its...

Blood Diamonds: Tracing the Deadly Path of the World's Most Precious Stones. (Mixed Media).
May 1, 2003... by Greg Campbell (Westview Press, ISBN 0 8133 3939 1) Diamonds originating in war zones -- 'conflict diamonds' or, less euphemistically, 'blood diamonds' -- amount for about four or five per cent of global output. While this may be a...

Letters to the Celestial Serbs. (Mixed Media).(Book Review)
May 1, 2003... by Gojko Beric Translated by Saba (Soqi Books/The Bosnian Institute, ISBN 0 86356 7312) For over 20 years the veteran Serb journalist Gojko Beric has been filing acerbic pieces on the social and cultural mores of his compatriots...

Shining Brother, Shining Sister. (Mixed Media).(Sound Recording Review)
May 1, 2003... by Jackie Leven REVIEWERS (Cooking Vinyl COOKCD25O CD) Peter Whittaker * Louise Gray * Malcolm Lewis * George Fisher It's difficult to place Jackie Leven. The Scot is one of those singer-songwriters whose complex talents have...

Life and Debt. (Mixed Media).(Movie Review)
May 1, 2003... directed by Stephanie Black The statistics ram the message home. When, in the 1970s, Prime Minister Michael Manley bitterly accepted the need for a 'short-term' IMF loan, Jamaica's debt was $800 million. It's now $7,000 million and the...

Border/La Linea. (Mixed Media).(Sound Recording Review)
May 1, 2003... by Lila Downs (Narado World 72438-10265-2-6 CD) After dropping out of music school and spending a period following the Grateful Dead, Lila Downs was back home in Oaxaca, Mexico, when a neighbour asked her to translate a document from...

Pure. (Mixed Media).(Movie Review)
May 1, 2003... directed by Gillies MacKinnon Paul is 10 years old. His father is dead. His mother, hooked on heroin, can hardly function. Stoical, careworn Paul looks after her and his younger brother. In an early scene we see Paul getting his brother...

Interview with Haifa Zangana. (Marking Waves).(Brief Article)(Interview)
May 1, 2003... WHEN I met Haifa at home in North London, her niece had just telephoned from Iraq. Her baby had been delivered prematurely by caesarean because war was a bout to start. 'The hospitals wilt be full of casualties or bombed. Women in Iraq are...

I'd like to know: Eduardo Galeano wonders what George W Bush knows that we don't. (Essay).
May 1, 2003... In the middle of last year, while he was cooking up this war, George W Bush declared that 'we must be ready to attack in any dark corner of the world'. I guess Iraq must be a dark corner of the world. Does Bush think Texas was the cradle of...

Egypt. (Country Profile).(Brief Article)
May 1, 2003... ON 23 February this year the Egyptian Government renewed the State of Emergency which has been in place since the assassination of President Anwar Sadat in September 1981. The same thing happens routinely every three years. Routinely, too, the...