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Vol.
13 No. 44…Dedicated to the Dialogue on Race…November 1, 2010
Fighting for a Free
Press
John Burl Smith
The need to be informed should be
considered a basic human right. For without essential information, people can
not make intelligent 
decisions
vital to their survival. Many individuals and groups throughout the world face
life and death situations daily on the frontlines in a war in which pens and
pencils, cell phones and computers and video recorders and cameras are the
weapons of choice against the forces of tyranny, oppression and despotism.
Reporters Without Borders is a group that monitors the battles that occur daily
in isolated backwashes as well as modern industrialized nations.
Reporters Without Borders (RWB) was founded in 1985 to fight for press freedom
around the world. Its mission is to defend journalists and media assistants
imprisoned or persecuted for doing their job, expose mistreatment and torture,
fight censorship and laws that undermine press freedom, provide financial aid
to journalists or media outlets in difficulty -- pay for lawyers, medical care
and buy equipment -- as well support families of imprisoned journalists and
work to improve the safety of journalists, especially those reporting from war
zones.
Prior to taking such actions,
researchers from Reporters Without Borders compile reports of press freedom
violations. They verify information and send protest letters to pressure
authorities regarding better treatment for journalists. RWB works to build a
critical mass of support for journalists under attack from governments that do
not respect people's right of access to information and need to be informed.
They also send fact-finding missions to investigate journalists' working
conditions in the field, as well as meet with the authorities in countries
where journalists are imprisoned or murdered.
RWB conducts publicity campaigns
against countries that do not respect the basic right to be informed and tries
to make them international pariahs in the eyes of media and other governments.
Beyond its daily press releases, fact-finding mission reports and regular
publications, Reporters Without Borders stage several annual events to
highlight the issue of press freedom. Most notably, the Round-up of Press
Freedom in the World held in January summarizes the level of media censorship
during the previous year by detailing the number of journalists and media
assistants arrested, threatened, physically attacked or killed. For instance,
thus far in 2010, the list includes journalists and media assistants killed 36,
imprisoned 164 and netizens imprisoned 112.
World Press Freedom Day (May 3)
is another RWB function that publishes a list identifying the predators of
press freedom. A book of photographs is also published and sold to help the
organization continue its work. Following in October, the Worldwide Press
Freedom Index is issued; it measures the degree of freedom journalists and
media has in more than 160 countries.
This year the
Reporters Without Borders selects a day each November as Jailed Journalists
Support Day. They lobby individuals, organizations and businesses to 'adopt'
imprisoned journalists and to publicize their plight, so they are not
forgotten. A second book of photographs is also published on this day to raise
money to help imprisoned journalists. Finally in December, the Reporters
Without Borders Prize is presented. It honors journalists who, by their work,
attitude or principled stands, have shown a strong belief in press freedom,
media outlets that exemplify the battle for the right to inform the public and
to be informed, defenders of press freedom and cyber-dissidents.
On March 12, 2010, Reporters Without Borders celebrated World Day Against Cyber
Censorship. The goal of the event was to rally everyone in support of a single
Internet that is unrestricted and accessible to all. It is also meant to draw
attention to the fact that by creating new spaces for exchanging ideas and information,
the Internet is a force for freedom. However, more and more governments have
realized this and are reacting by trying to apply regulatory control over the
Internet. RWB followed this event by issuing its Enemies of the Internet list,
including such notables as
Although Reporters Without
Borders was awarded the European Parliament's Sakharov Prize for Freedom of
Thought in 2005, recognizing people's need for information and to be informed
as a human right is far more important than accolades. Journalists around the
world, like Mumia Abu Jamal, who has been on death row in the
No Borders, No Nations
By Anti-Flag
I always thought if you want to change the world
Then you have to start with yourself
So if the heads of state want to end terrorism
They should go ahead
and kill themselves
I will not sign my blind faith away
To an unjustly leader of the unjust police state
Corporate masters live in their cesspool
Of extreme wealth and
excess
The phrase world leaders
Does not describe the heads of state
Those few in power
Work only for the corporate sake
No action, no interest, no humanity at all
As the corporate towers rise up
They watch the people
fall
A government untouchable by the people
Run by the corporations of the world
Enslaving mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters
Profits put before people
Equal force, equal reaction
Equal suppression, equal intimidation
Equal prosecution, Equal propaganda
EQUAL REBELLION!
I won't sign my blind faith away
To an unjustly leader of the unjust police state
Corporate masters live in their lapse pool
Of extreme wealth and excess
The phrase world leaders
Does not describe the heads of state
Those few in power
Work only for the corporate sake
No action, no interest, no humanity at all
As the corporate
towers rise up...
We've got to make a change
No religions, sexual preference
And regardless of your race
We've got to make a change
No war, corporate run
Governments, no police state
We've got to make a change
For the good of the human race
We've got to make a change
For the good of the
human race
And you still look me in the eye
And you still wonder why
Your cities f*cking burn
No borders, no nations
No flags, no patriots
About Me: Punk rockers originally based in
Ralph J. Bunche (1904-1971)
"I...believe in the
essential goodness of my fellow man, which leads me to believe that no problem
of human relations is ever 
insoluble...There
are no warlike peoples - just warlike leaders...May there be, in our time, at
long last, a world at peace in which we, the people, may for once begin to make
full use of the great good that is in us." Ralph Johnson Bunche
Ralph Johnson Bunche was born in
An exemplary student and class
valedictorian, Bunche graduated from
In 1936, Bunche authored a
pamphlet entitled A World View of
Race. In it, he wrote: "And so class will some day supplant
race in world affairs. Race war will then be merely a side-show to the gigantic
class war which will be waged in the big tent we call the world." From
1936 to 1940, Bunche served as contributing editor of the journal Science and Society: A Marxian Quarterly.
From 1938 until 1940, Bunche worked with the Swedish sociologist Gunnar Myrdal
on his classical study of black Americans that resulted in Myrdal's 1944 book,
An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and American Democracy.
From 1941-1944, Dr. Bunche served
in the Office of Strategic Services, the predecessor to the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA). He joined the United States Department of State in
1944, becoming the first black to head a departmental division in federal
government, the Division of Dependent Area Affairs (1945). An expert on
trusteeship matters, Dr. Bunche participated in writing the UN Charter and in 1946;
he became director of the trusteeship division of the UN.
Beginning in 1947, as a senior
member of the staff of the UN commission on
Despite having won the Nobel Prize, Bunche continued to face racism across the
Dr. Bunche continued to work at
the UN, becoming an Undersecretary (1955) and Undersecretary General of the UN
(1969). Bunche directed peacekeeping operations for the UN and was responsible
for the UN program on peaceful uses of atomic energy. Dr. Bunche retired from
the UN in 1971.
Throughout his life, Bunche
worked to improve race relations, education and further the cause of civil
rights. For 22 years, he served on the board of the National Association for
the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), earning its highest honor, the
Spingarn Medal, in 1949. The recipient of numerous honorary degrees and awards,
including the Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian award, Ralph
Johnson Bunche, husband, father and grandfather, died on December 10, 1971.
(Sources: www.aaregistry.com,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Bunche
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1950/bunche-bio.html)
UNESCO's Executive
Board Decisions
UNESCO's Executive Board, which
comprises 58 Member States, convenes twice annually to review the
implementation of the 
programme
adopted by the General Conference. The 185th board session was held October
5-21, 2010.
The board adopted five decisions
concerning UNESCO's work in the occupied Palestinian and
On the Ascent to the Mughrabi
Gate in the Old Jerusalem, the Board voted 31 to 5 (17 abstentions) to reaffirm
the necessity of Israel's cooperation in order to arrange access to the
Mughrabi Ascent site for Jordanian and Waqf experts and that no measure should
be taken which will affect the authenticity and integrity of the site, in
accordance with the Convention for the Protection of the World Cultural and
Natural Heritage and the Hague Convention for the protection of Cultural
property in the Event of Armed Conflict.
On the issue of
As to the Palestinian sites of
al-Haram al-Ibrahimi/Tomb of the Patriarchs in al-Khalil/Hebron and the Bilal
bin Rabah Mosque/Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem, the Board voted 44 to one (12
abstentions) to reaffirm that the two sites are an integral part of the
occupied Palestinian Territories and that any unilateral action by the Israeli
authorities is to be considered a violation of international law, the UNESCO
Conventions and the United Nations and Security Council resolutions.
Regarding educational and
cultural institutions in the Occupied Arab territories, the board voted 41 to
one (15 abstentions) expressing its "continuing concern" about the
harmful impact of the separation Wall and other practices on the activities of
cultural and educational institutions, as well as obstacles that result which
prevent Palestinian school children and students from being an integral part of
their social fabric and from exercising their full right to education. The
decision calls on the Director-General to continue efforts to preserve the
human, social and cultural fabric of the occupied Syrian Golan, and to
undertake efforts to offer appropriate curricula and provide more grants and
adequate assistance to the education and cultural institutions of the occupied
Syrian Golan.
On the reconstruction and development of
The harshest criticisms of the
board's decisions on the Occupied Palestinian and
One of the sites, in the city of
Earlier this year, in a move
Palestinians view as another land grab,
Israeli Society Shaped by Borders
By Matti Friedman
All countries are literally
defined by their borders, but few have had their history, society and national
mindset shaped by their frontiers as much as
Most residents of
Israelis can theoretically cross
two of their borders, into
With their barbed wire coils,
hills scarred by patrol roads and weather-beaten guard posts manned by young
soldiers, the borders are perhaps the most dominant single feature of the
landscape.
Numerous infiltrations, skirmishes
and wars have made the frontiers a matter of life and death. The border dispute
with the Palestinians in the West Bank has become the central feature of
The mediator was U.N. envoy Ralph
Bunche, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating a truce. In one instance,
as the Israeli historian Tom Segev has written, the American diplomat had
commemorative plates made, then threatened to break them over the heads of the
recalcitrant delegates. The end of the negotiations gave
In 1967,
The question of the border
between
"Between me and you, between
us and them," one contemporary songwriter wrote, "without a border,
there are no limits to anything."
In 1995 an assassin opposed to a
government attempt to set a border in a peace agreement shot and killed
Rabin, as a young field commander,
had been one of the negotiators at the Hotel des Roses when the country's
borders were first set.
At that time, before the
frontiers had hardened into long-term enmity, Rabin recorded in his memoirs, he
believed that first agreement meant "we were moving toward peace."
"We all believed it," he wrote.
Israeli Motorist Runs Down Palestinian Boy
By Richard James
Dramatic images have emerged of
the moment an Israeli 
motorist
drove straight into a young Palestinian boy in
The child had been part of a group throwing stones at Israeli cars following
news the country's military had killed two Hamas militants in the West Bank
city of Hebron earlier on Friday, October 8.
Amazingly the boy only sustained
'light injuries' after being thrown into the air by the vehicle and twisting
over its roof.
The incident occurred in the
mostly Arab east
The majority of the boys, with
their t-shirts wrapped round their heads to disguise their identity, were lined
up on either side of the road near a zebra crossing ready to attack the
vehicle.
Two members of the group were
positioned in the center of the road - leading to the collision, with the
motorist apparently driving straight into one of the boys.
The young boy was thrown up over
the car's bonnet after the driver drove into him. A second boy was pushed into
the side of the road. Both amazingly escaped with only minor injuries.
Earlier on Friday it was
confirmed Israeli troops killed two senior Hamas militants as tensions between
both sides continue to be severely strained with the peace process stalling
once again over
The two gunmen were said to have been wanted in connection with the killing of
four Israelis near
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also released a statement praising
the military for killing the militants and promising that
The peace talks resumed at the
White House on September 2 after a 20-month hiatus. The talks again appeared to
reach deadlock three weeks later when Mr Netanyahu refused to extend a
ten-month halt to construction of Jewish settlements in the
Professional
Journalistic Standards and Code of Ethics
Recently, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO) launched a new website dedicated to Professional Journalistic
Standards and Code of Ethics. The website is a tool that gathers the existing
information on media accountability, freely available on the Internet, in one
place and provides easy access to it. To develop this new tool, UNESCO worked
in collaboration with the
This fast, flexible and free online resource provides information on media
accountability and self-regulation systems, media legislation and models for
setting up and managing press councils, and it makes accessible reviews of the
existing mechanisms in Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia and
The website principally features
three thematic sections. (1) The media legislation and regulations section
provides examples of general media laws and regulatory frameworks at both
national and international level. (2) The regulatory bodies section features
existing press councils and relevant professional networks, and presents a
brief overview of different types of media ombudsmen. This section also
includes examples of media councils/ ombudsman that have arbitrated and
adjudicated on complaints against the press. (3) The codes of ethics section
provides links to the codes of ethics and professional standards based upon
self-regulation.
In addition to these thematic sections, the site provides a resources section,
which includes materials related to media accountability and self-regulation
such as publications, websites and useful contacts where one can find more
relevant information on the subject.
The website sections are
accessible at: www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-information/themes/professional-journalistic-standards-and-code-of-ethics/
.
Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes and
Telephone Calls
Email www.cbs.com
...Hezbollah calls for boycott of UN tribunal ...By Zeina Karam...The leader of
Hezbollah called Thursday on all Lebanese to boycott the U.N. tribunal
investigating the 2005 assassination of a former prime minister, saying all
information gathered by the team was being sent to Israel. Sheik Hassan
Nasrallah spoke Thursday, a day after a crowd of women attacked two U.N.
investigators and a Lebanese interpreter as they gathered evidence at a private
gynecology clinic in
Email www.ap.com
...Noted Israeli archaeologist dies after fall...
Email www.ap.com
....Schools, stipends trigger Israeli religious battle...By Aron Heller...
During its six decades of existence,
Email leekuk@yahoo.com ...Regarding your story on