By H.E. Prof Kristina Sinemus, Hessian Minister of Digital Strategy and Development.
“Too big to care” – this is how Thierry Breton, European Commissioner for Internal Market, described the problem: Digital platforms with considerable market power exercise control over whole platform ecosystems.
They act as “gatekeepers” by limiting access to digital markets for smaller businesses and start-ups. The dependency of many businesses on these gatekeepers often leads to unfair practices. This is why the European Commission presented the Digital Markets Act in December 2020, which is currently being debated in the European Parliament and the Council.
The aim of the new regulation is to enable all market players to operate in a fair digital ecosystem.
Indeed, the time is ripe for a new European framework that ensures fair competition on the Internal Market irrespective of the market power of the platform on the one hand but leaves sufficient room for innovation on the other hand.
Platforms significantly change the way our economies and industries have traditionally been organised. They are the bedrock of future value creation systems. They are already part of our daily lives – be it as a social networking platform, marketplace or content platform. The European Commission estimates there are over 10 000 online platforms operating in Europe’s digital economy.
A recent study by the German Bundesnetzagentur – the authority ensuring compliance with the Telecommunications Act, Postal Act and Energy Act in Germany – confirms their importance for our economy and SMEs in particular. Between March and August 2020, during the Bundesnetzagentur’s public consultation a total of 210 business customers reported on their experience with marketing and sales activities via digital platforms in Germany. Nearly three quarters of business customers felt they would have considerable difficulties competing successfully in the German market without the use of digital platforms. Overall, half of business customers assume they would not even be able to exist on the market without digital platforms.
Against this background, it is worrying that only 12 out of the 100 biggest platforms in the world are European. Europe is dramatically lagging behind!
It is urgent and important for Europe’s digital sovereignty that it strengthen its platform economy. New innovative platforms and digital services must increasingly be created in Germany and Europe. We have a strong industrial base in Hesse and Germany, and many innovative companies in the information and communications technology sector, for which platforms are becoming increasingly important.
This is why the European Commission’s proposal for a Digital Markets Act is so important. The proposed regulation is designed to ensure contestable and fair markets in the digital sector by providing regulatory safeguards throughout the European Union against unfair behaviour by very large gatekeeper platforms towards other providers and clients with less market power. I fully support this vision: by creating the right regulatory framework, we allow smaller platforms and start-ups to enter the market and to grow, strengthening our European platform economy in the process.
At the same time, we ensure fair market conditions for all companies on the Internal Market, in particular SMEs that need platform services for their business. However, we must strike the right balance. Yes, we need to tame the gatekeepers.
Big platforms must not be “too big to care”. They have to respect European rules. However, we must not over regulate either. We need to avoid burdensome requirements that could hamper innovation. The behavioural obligations set by the Digital Markets Act should be complemented by a general clause that gives a certain flexibility regarding new business models and behaviour in order to make the new regulation future-proof.
By HHSheikha Intisar AlSabah. Founder and Chairwoman of Intisar Foundation, member of Kuwait’s Ruling House.
Trauma is a consequence of being exposed to an experience that exceeds one’s ability to cope with or integrate the emotions involved, leaving long-term negative consequences on the brain.[1] Another explanation that I also appreciate is that it is a rupture[2] in meaning making, a discrepancy between appraised and global meaning of a situation that affects the person’s sense of the world as meaningful and their own life as worthwhile.[3]
There are many potential causes of trauma over our lifetime, but wars definitely create a wide variety of traumatic events that result in many people developing different types and degrees of post-traumatic and/or mental disorders. The World Health Organisation states that 1 in 11 (9%) people who have experienced war or other conflict in the previous 10 years, will have a moderate or severe mental disorder, and that 1 in 5 (22%) people living in an area affected by conflict is estimated to have depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, bipolar disorder, or schizophrenia.[4]
I fall into a sub-category of people who were left with anger and violent feelings, even towards my children, after living through the state of war and all other traumatic events that happened in connection to it. I still remember that my every waking minute was consumed with fear of everything and everyone.
I also fall into a sub-category of people who consider themselves healed from it.
I know that I am not alone in this unusual box of how I choose to describe myself for the purpose of this article, but sadly, I also believe that the box is not crowded.
How did I get to this? To begin with, I was one of many who received the traditional humanitarian aid response which, until this day, includes the delivery of human, medical, food, shelter, water sanitation, and hygiene resources, but not any kind of psychological support – neither in the immediate aftermath of the traumatic experience I went through, nor later.
Over the years, I have been blessed with faith, mindset, willpower, and perseverance to subject myself to psychological support that has enabled me to eventually fulfill all the parameters of how mental health is defined today.[5]
Yet, whenever I sit in a meeting to discuss psychological support programmes for women affected by war and to explore how these are linked to Peacebuilding, I cannot help but wonder how different my life would have been if my psychological recovery had started much earlier than it actually did. In a split second, my mind starts listing the implications that this lack of timely and adequate mental health care back then, as well as for many years later, had on my psychological wellbeing and, for instance, on the wellbeing of my children.
However, I am not talking only from personal experience when I say that a person traumatised by the brutality of war and violence can rebuild their lives, revitalise their families, and spread peace in their communities, in a very short period of time – if and when given proper psychological support.
In 2021, I have evidence that further supports us advocating the inclusion of psychological support programmes to people, and especially women, affected by war into international humanitarian aid and all our peacebuilding efforts, including international and national war and disaster preparedness and emergency plans.
Source: A pilot study conducted by Intisar Foundation in Shatila Refugee Camp in Lebanon between 2019 and 2020 using psychometric scales.
The international community has been exploring innovative ways in which international organisations, donors, governments, and local non-governmental organizations can contribute to better conflict prevention and management, Peacebuilding and reconciliation.
However, one formula is simple but easily overlooked – offering immediate mental health support to survivors of war, and especially women among them, is the innovationin Peacebuilding that we need. Therefore, we must make mental health support an integral part of international humanitarian aid and any international and national war and disaster preparedness and emergency plans.
We must do it because, in 2021, we know that, if not treated, mental health issues increase with age and deprive war and disaster-affected populations of ever fully perceiving a future of Peace, stability, and hope for themselves and their families.[6]
We must do it because, in 2021, we are sad to witness that many of the world’s emergencies have become longer-lasting and increasingly harder to address, exposing conflict and disaster-affected populations to years and decades of repeatedly experiencing psychological distress.[7]
Intisar Foundation has been supporting Arab women traumatised by war and violence with its culturally competent, neuroscience-based, and socially impactful psychological support programme based on drama therapy.
One of our current research projects analyses how tackling the psychological impact of trauma on women affected by war leads to their lower levels of aggression and higher impulse control at home, which then reduces the danger of them maltreating their children, and consequently, reduces the children developing any maladaptive behaviours that might lead to violence in the future. In this way, where there was conflict, we manage to raise Peaceful children.
Conclusion
The Preamble to the Constitution of UNESCO declares that “since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed.”
I would humbly add that “since our evidence shows that Peace begins in the minds of women, it is the minds of women that we need to support for Peace to flow forth to reach and affect all of humanity.”
By H.E. Mr. Yusuf Tuggar, Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in Germany.
The subject of restitution of Africa’s stolen cultural properties is not a new one; African countries like Nigeria have been calling for the return of such assets since they gained independence from colonial rule. The momentum the subject has gained of recent, is an attestation to the progress we have made as humans in recognising and observing universal human rights and fundamental freedoms, irrespective of race, sex, language or religion.
When Nigeria became independent in1960, many African countries were still under colonial bondage- Angola, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and South Africa were ruled by racist regimes. It was as part of the struggle to liberate such countries that Nigeria hosted the Festival of Black & African Arts & Culture in 1977 (FESTAC ‘77). Culture was at the very centre of the struggle against colonialism because of the manner it was used to racially segregate people under colonial rule in sub-Saharan Africa.
African cultures and their memetic manifestations were considered inferior by colonial overlords. An epistemology was created that promised integration and social mobility to the ‘native’, if she or he abandoned her or his inferior culture and adopted that of the European overlord and mastered it.
Exclusive European living quarters were created that Africans could aspire to live in only if they abandoned their culture and traditions wholesale and adopted European ones. The educational system also emphasised this epistemology with a historiography that presented sub-Saharan Africa as tabula rasa with (to paraphrase Hegel) no history worth studying prior to contact with enlightened outsiders. Such an epistemological foundation to newly independent African nation-states made nation building for countries like Nigeria all the more challenging, even as they struggled to help liberate others.
But in most cases the best evidence to demonstrate to young Africans that African culture and history were neither inferior nor non-existent before contact with ‘enlightened outsiders’ was not available; it was in the possession of northern hemispheric museums and private collectors. Nigeria, the most populous African country with over 350 different languages (and the largest economy today), was not even allowed to borrow the famous Queen Idia mask to use as the symbol of FESTAC 77 from Britain. The mask was part of the huge loot stolen by British soldiers during the murderous attack on Benin City in 1897. Some of these items were sold on to museums in Germany that are today finally beginning to respond positively to Nigeria’s demand for their return.
Restitution has not been short of international legal premises over the last 50 years; the United Nations General Assembly, UNESCO, International Council of Museums (ICOM) have all enacted resolutions and conventions that were for the most part ignored. Although Germany was not a signatory to a 1970 UNESCO Convention prohibiting the export of cultural properties, in 1972, the German Bundesgerichtshof (Supreme Court) in Karlsruhe it upheld the provisions of the Convention as well as Nigerian domestic law in a decision on six bronze statues illegally shipped from Port Harcourt to Hamburg. The court maintained that the UNESCO Convention was representative of international public policy and “the export of cultural property contrary to a prohibition of the country of origin for the reason merits, in the interest of maintaining proper standards for the international trade in cultural objects, no protection from [German] civil law”.
Nigeria is happy with the support restitution of its stolen cultural properties is receiving in Germany and the all-important cooperation of the German government. The discourse further presents an opportunity for a global re-evaluation of the ontology of Museums in the 21st Century. The time is rife.
A state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.
Definition of Health, Preamble of the World Health Organisation (WHO) Constitution, 1948.
By Professor Anis Bajrektarevic.
For months, many argue that our Covid (C-19) response is a planetary fiasco, whose size is yet to surface with its mounting disproportionate and enduring secondary effects, causing tremendous socio-economic, demographic and cross-generational, political and psychosomatic contractions and convulsions. However, worse than our response is our silence about it.
It is an established fact that the quintessence of Nazism was not Hitler and the circle of darkness around him. It was rather a commonly shared ‘banality of crime’ atmosphere: Benevolent acceptance of ordinary village people living next to Auschwitz, Mauthausen, Dachau that the nation must be ‘purified’ …
The day when questioning stops and silent acceptance (especially among the well informed, well mobilised and educated ones) becomes a ‘new normal’ is a day when fascism walks in a big time. Of course, today we have a diagnosis for it: manufacturing consent through choice architecture. It is done via fear-imprisoned and media infantilised (returned to the pre-Oedipal phase) psychology of the de-socialised and alienated, an atomised one.
Appinion disguised as opinion – Who is really in charge?
There is no political or economic crisis. There is neither energy crisis, nor health, nor environmental crisis. Every crisis is just a deficit of cognitive mind that comes to the same; a moral crisis.
Ecological Globalistan, Political Terroristan, the author
Did we really forget basic teaching of our history: Every time when the power was unchecked, it degenerated into the obscure brutality; ritualising its force with a stamp on or under our skin to visualise and immortalise the twilight of reason?
So, our C-19 response and its widespread synchronicity (of measures and its timing) illustrates – the argument goes – nothing else but a social pathology: the non-transparent concentration of power, and our overall democracy recession – further bolstering surveillance and social control systems.
All that as lasting consequences of cutbacks, environmental holocaust, privatisation of key intergovernmental and vital national institutions, ill-aimed globalisation as well as of the fixation on overly allopathic, mandated (not a repurposed, but usually novel expensive and inadequately tested) drugs-centred healthcare, and lack of public data commons. Public health or private wealth? Pandemic or plundermic …
Ever larger number of citizens do not see the mainstream media (or pop culture celebrities) at service for the population. Dialogue and opinion is discouraged and silenced, if not, even sanctioned. Our western, ‘modern’ medicine still falls short of consensus on a fundamental question: Is illness contracted (from outside) or created (conditions within our body). Hence, the faith in western medicine is in a free fall. Compromised generational contract and thinning social consensus are challenging our fabrics like never before in recorded history.
The first real stress-test since the end of the WWII, the United Nations (UN) clearly did not pass. Many feel deeply disappointed with and disfranchised by the universal organisation and its Agencies for their lasting “self-marginalisation”.[1] Is our cohesion irreversibly destroyed?
Early lockdowns, mid-March 2020, were justified by a need to flatten the curve of the ‘sudden’ virus (harmfulness, mortality and transmissibility) impact, since there were not enough hospital beds. In the meantime, the lockdowns were extended and widened, curves not arguably altered. Still, for the past 12 months, there is hardly any new hospital built in the EU although the non-essential medical services, at most cases, were suspended.[2] Neither there was nor is any massive investment into general health prevention. The only visible infrastructure growth is in 5/6G network expansion.
Following a simple ratio that the one’s state of health is genetic expression of life-style choices made, it is no surprise that there are also growing speculations if the lockdown – as the most notorious expression of monofocal perspective and rejection to any scientifically contested, debate-based integrated judgment – is invasion or protection:
And, if is there any back-to-normal exit from the crisis, or this disaster ‘turned into planetary terror, through global coup d’état’ will be exploited to further something already pre-designed (with a fear, not as a side-effect, but rather as a tool manufactured to gain control). Simply, is all that more related to the biotronics and demographics (IoT and Internet of Bodies) – ‘epsteinisation en masse’, than to health and economics or any common social purpose?
E.g. Le Monde Diplomatique – while examining the possible merger between tech oligopoly and political monopoly – claimed from a very beginning of this crisis that: “Political decisions have been central in shaping this tragedy — from the destruction of animal habitats, to the asymmetric funding of medical research, to the management of the crisis itself. They will also determine the world into which we emerge into after the worst is over.” Over the past 30 years, every critical juncture had a similar epilogue: pardon and enhancement for the capital, a burden and suppression for the labour. The C-19 is no exception to it: Ever since early lockdowns of March 2020, the capital flows unhindered while the labour, ideas and humans are under the house arrest.[3] The XXI century frontline is the right to health (incl. body integrity and informed consent) and labour, privacy and other fundamental human rights and liberties. (LMD, IV20)
Is the political, economic or moral triumph of the West still possible past this crisis?
Every crisis since Westphalia until the so-called financial crisis of 2008-09, political West exited in (what was seen as) moral triumph. What is in front of us?
Earth provides enough to satisfy everyone’s needs, but not for a single man’s greed
The rate of profit does not, like rent and wages, rise with the prosperity, and fall with the declension, of the society. On the contrary, it is naturally low in rich, and high in poor countries, and it is always highest in the countries which are going fastest to ruin.
The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith
Still to be precise, the WHO- decreed virus pandemic brought nothing truly new to the already overheated conduct of, and increasingly binarized, world affairs. It only amplified and accelerated what was present for quite some time – a rift between alienated power centres, each on its side of Pacific, and the rest. No wonder that the work on and dispatch of the C-19 vaccine is more an arms race than it is a collaborative humanity plan. Look at its geography and conditionalities.
Would all this be – in its epilogue – about the expansion of (the 4th industrial revolution caused) techno-totalitarian model of government as an alternative to liberal democracy (from one-party democracy to one-party autocracy)? Devolutionary singularisation into techno-feudalism as the highest stage of capitalism? Is now a time to return to the nation-state, a great moment for all dictators-in-waiting to finally build a cult of personality? Hence, will our democracy be electro-magnetised and vaccinated for a greater good (or greedier ‘god’)? Is the decolonisation (and deprivatisation) of global health a failed attempt?[4] Will we (ever) be allowed to exit the year of 2020?[5]
Turning human body into an (purposely unoptimized) operative system that needs constant updates and antivirus programs is a dangerous thought. The entire scientific community considers the attempt to mandate the experimental biological agent (while calling it the C-19 vaccine) as very troubling. Having these calls chiefly advocated and aggressively promoted by the handful of self-interest driven private companies – all accompanied with a contradictory and confusing governmental stance which is siding up with the industry it was supposed to regulate – is highly disturbing. No surprise that ever-larger societal segments perceive it as warfare not a welfare. The world that for over a century portrayed itself as Kantian is rapidly turning into a dark Hobbesian (immuno-apartheid) place. Is now anarchy just one step away?[6]
One is certain, confronting the long-term interests of stakeholders with the short-term interests of shareholders, the private sector from both sides of Atlantic exercises disproportionate power in the technological share (infrastructure and data). It also largely benefits from the massive public research funds – especially in the fields such as bioinformatics, AI, nanorobotics, or geophysics engineering – while in return paying dismal, negotiable tax if any at all.[7]
Far too often it comes with the nondisclosure agreements, liability outsourcing/ protections and other unilaterally beneficial legal instruments as well as with the close ties between the private sector, intelligence agencies and media.[8]
The same applies to a big Pharma which increasingly dictates a non-preventive, monofocal approach to medicine and research, and controls reporting about it – not always in the name of our public health.
Therefore, the above represents the largest underreported (or ignored) threat to our democracy and future societal conduct.
Conclusively, bioinformatics (including the synthetic biology and data-to-genes sequestration for data storage or data mining purpose) – as much as the geoengineering itself – is a dual-use technology. Past its formative age (with a digital infrastructure near completion), it has today a huge weaponization potential for at home and abroad, be it for state or non-state actors.
Consequently and urgently, this necessitates a comprehensive legislation which builds up on the Universal Charter of Human Rights and Nuremberg Code, and rests on its effective enforcement (with the monitoring of compliance mechanisms as set for the IAEA, OPCW, RC-BTWC and the Nagoya protocol),[9] nationally and internationality, and for all actors.[10]
Threat of Otherness: Criminalisation of different opinion
All state authority is derived from the people (XX 2) … All Germans shall have the right to resist any person seeking to abolish this constitutional order, if no other remedy is available. (XX 4)
Civil disobedience as the Constitutional Right[11]
By many accounts, 2020 – a year of astonishing synchronicity, when distancing became social[12] – will be remembered as the worst year in living memory (since 1939). Some would say; C-19 stopped history, as it locked down our dialogues and atrophied political instincts of masses (with too many cases of arbitrary censorship streaming from the privately owned social platforms). Still, 2020 only quarantined and halted us, while in fact it accelerated history. This especially refers to the ‘Old Continent’.
People have the right to know what those in power are doing, especially in times of crisis. Therefore, Europe’s eldest and the most comprehensive multilateral mechanism – Council of Europe, promulgated Convention on Access to Official Documents more than ten years ago in Tromsø, Norway (entering in force on 01 December 2020). This Charter is the first binding international legal instrument to recognise a general right of access to official documents held by public authorities.[13]
As this author noted back in spring 2020: “It is amply clear from the C-19 event that the right to health is an issue for all. The search for a reliable cure for pandemics control is not a matter of private business, but of fundamental individual rights situated on higher levels of sociableness, as embedded in the UN and EU Charters, and being obligatory for each of the UN Specialized Agencies or EU bodies to comply with. (Not a fear-based manufactured giving-in, but the right for informed consent as an inseparable segment of the constitutionally endorsed right to health.)
Proportionality of our (current and future) responses in Europe is another key issue. Hence, what presents itself as an imperative is the universal participation through intergovernmental mechanisms and popular control to it. That rule applies for at home and for abroad, as the Union has to comply with (and set example to) it urgently.
Growing particularisms in Brussels quarters, where (on taxpayers’ money and public trust), it is more and more the particular – be it individual, regional, national, lobby-groups driven – interest that prevails over the solid all-European project of our common presence purpose and future.”[15]
Past the Brexit, the Union has to be extra cautious about its chronic democracy-deficit, apparatchik alienation of Brussels, as well as the brewing concerns that the EU without UK becomes yet another greater Germany.[16]
Of Paper Tiger and its Talking Heads
The one-year score (March 2020 – March 2021) of the Union is highly disturbing:
It repeatedly failed to defend human rights – as its founding principles. On contrary, many of its decisions compromised core liberties and freedoms, and it directly contributed to furthering the speed and severity of unprecedented deterioration of constitutional rights and fundamental freedoms;[17]
Alarming lack of transparency in its actings and decision-making;
Absence of any initiative to spark and enhance thorough, all-stakeholders democratic debates on the ongoing crisis and ways out;
Turning a deaf ear to arbitrary movement restrictions imposed by narrow circles of executive branch in numerous occasions in number of MS;
Turning a blind eye to excessive use of police force against peaceful citizenry on streets in numerous occasions in number of MS;
Indifference and inaction on the suppression of media freedoms within and beyond the Block, while ignoring the increase in arbitrary censorship conducted by the foreign non-state and/or local state actors;
The EU did not protect general public health of its population. On contrary, many of its decisions or inactions contributed to further deterioration of a long-term conditions of population of all generations especially children and youth;
Union did not stop fragmentation of the Block. On contrary, its accelatered and widened inter-regional rifts between (or even within) different member states;
The EU did not improve its standing within the wider European neighbourhood;
On each of the above, the Commission, Parliament and the rest of Brussels apparatus remains in denial – which triggers further loss of international credibility, confidence and domestic support, and drifts the unionistic Project into irrelevance.[18]
After all, the truth is plain to see; countries with the highly (deregulated and) privatised health sector are the C-19 worst offs (eg. USA) – as measured by the fatalities, overall socio-economic cost (incl. the long-term health prospects, or redistribution and inequalities), damage to the social consensus (safety and security), and the speed of recovery. Countries of the centralised health sector which resides strictly in public hands and is under popular control did and are still making it far better. Those among them that keep high respect for individual rights, liberties and freedoms (eg. Sweden) are by far the best achievers.
How the issues of health will be balanced with the human rights – as these two are not excluding but are complementing each other – is the fundamental issue for the future.
Additionally, how (geno and pheno) data are generated, stored and governed, and ultimately used will be the second defining issue of global public health (and planetary support to or conflict over it) in the coming decades. That very much includes a dubious imposition of exclusionary digital bio surveillance grid that some circles advocate as “presumptive recommendation” to restore ‘normalcy’.
All in all, the one-year score (March 2020 – March 2021) is highly disturbing;
The health threat is not eliminated, on contrary it became multifaceted and severer, while
the human rights are standing closer to those in 1848 than to a 21st century.
Not only the socio-economic one, but every aspects of Western vitality is also vanishing rapidly, making the prospect of triumph of its model less likely with every passing day.
Beyond the disputes about possible initial intentionality (allegedly inspired by the sectarian, class, demographic, environmental or any other drive), let us close this text by displaying the probable epilogue: An ever-larger number of military strategists see (unfolding of) the C-19 event as a (techno-)biological warfare.
Here comes the powerful reminder that history gives us: decisions to go to war were never based on facts but on perceptions.[19] Therefore, make no mistake; the end game to any further continuation or escalation is the nuclear holocaust which none of us will escape.
About the author:
Prof. Anis H. Bajrektarević
Prof. Anis H. Bajrektarevic, is chairperson and professor in international law and global political studies, Vienna, Austria. He has authored eight books (for American and European publishers) and numerous articles on, mainly, geopolitics energy and technology. Professor is editor of the NY-based GHIR (Geopolitics, History and Intl. Relations) journal, and editorial board member of several similar specialized magazines on three continents.
His 9th book, ‘No Asian Century’ is scheduled for Fall 2021.
Ms. Tone Korssund-Eichinger receiving ‘The Federal Cross of Merit’ by the head of protocol of the Federal Foreign Office, Konrad Arz von Straussenburg, on behalf of the German Federal President.
By Alexandra Paucescu.
I remember our first meeting, which, by a beautiful coincidence, was the first time I had the honor of meeting Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor.
Tone Korssund-Eichinger was then the president of ‘Willkommen in Berlin’ diplomatic club. Someone introduced me to her and that’s how I met this remarkable woman, whom I came to admire enormously and try to follow her example.
Born in Norway, she studied German and History of Arts and travelled to Germany and UK for work. But it was back in Oslo where she met her future husband, a young German diplomat, who swept her away and took her around the world in the most exciting life adventure. Sierra Leone, Poland, Belgium and Kyrgyzstan were all places that she called home for a while and which left great memories, dear to her heart.
Tone Korssund-Eichinger
‘I loved the diplomatic life from the beginning. I had the chance to meet and connect to interesting and special people and get to know other cultures. But the most difficult part was that, as a diplomatic spouse, I couldn’t work during our postings abroad’, she says to me. She then adds ‘At first, I was afraid to lose my independence. You need to take time to think about what it really means to be a dedicated spouse, in particular how your ideas about a professional career are compatible with the life of a diplomat. Different jobs are affected in different ways. Be ready to look for satisfying alternatives for your professional work. Don’t see yourself just as “the spouse of…” Take care not to lose your own identity. Continue to be yourself.’
She tells me that her life was like a snowball, everything fell into place and from a small idea the right things developed effortlessly. She was a teacher, a guide to Scandinavia, worked for the Norwegian Embassy and campaigned for educational opportunities abroad.
President of WIB Diplomatic Club, Tone Korssund-Eichinger
‘I always found work back in Germany, but on the postings abroad my life was filled with volunteer work. I took advantage of my privileged position to support people in need and also make life easier for other spouses. My proudest moments in my professional life are in fact related to volunteer work. I am proud that I could make people happy through my efforts.’
Ever since she first came from her native Norway to Bonn, 38 years ago, volunteering became an important part of her life. She was on the board of the German-Norwegian Society and campaigned for German-Norwegian relations, especially for a German-Norwegian social agreement.
Tone Korssund-Eichinger always loved culture and she is still strongly committed to different causes concerning disabled children, disadvantaged women and poor artists. While abroad, she has often opened the German Residence to young artists’ works, by this validating and promoting them.
Her heart project is the “Ümut-Nadjeschda” center for handicapped children in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, which she supports to this day, also with the help of Inner Wheel Club Berlin-Mitte, whose president she was between 2018 and 2019.
After moving to Berlin, she became a member on the advisory board of “Familie und Partnerorganisation” in the German Foreign Office and chaired the Committee for foreign partners. It was particularly important to her to support newly arrived foreign partners in the early stages, by providing useful information and necessary contacts.
Through her work for the diplomatic club, she always tried to present a positive image of Berlin and Germany to the foreign diplomats and their spouses, through seminars, lectures, trips around the country and personal contacts. She is convinced that these actions also have positive effects on other areas of relations between Germany and its partners. Ever since we first met, I have seen her as an extremely energetic person, always ready for action but in the meantime, she is a very warm and empathic person, highly respected and admired for her generosity, wit and special elegance.
She now helps different kindergartens in Berlin and also organizes cultural events at her home.
All these rare and high qualities have been officially recognized last year (on June 5, 2020), when she was awarded ‘The Federal Cross of Merit’ by the head of protocol of the Federal Foreign Office, Konrad Arz von Straussenburg, on behalf of the German Federal President. He said then ‘this award is also an important incentive for further volunteer work, for projects at home and abroad.’
Tone tells me ‘when I was first told that I would get this medal, I was honestly surprised. To me, voluntary work was always a natural thing to do. At first, I thought that maybe I didn’t fully deserve it, but then I looked back and listed all the things that I’ve done throughout the years and I realized that this is an important recognition for all my life’s work. I am proud very of it now!’
She should be proud, indeed! I am proud to have met this inspiring woman, who never stops. She is today as busy as ever, being involved with the ‘Inner Wheel Club’, leader of the ‘History and Politics’ group at the diplomatic club, and also studying at the Technical University Berlin about city planning and sustainable urbanistic development. This woman simply amazes everyone with her endless energy!
She says that it’s important to ‘make the most of every situation, to enjoy every day as it was your last, without regrets for missed chances’. She lives her life with passion and has lots of plans for the future, always finding time and energy to share wisdom with others and to help whenever needed, as only great characters can do.
‘Be a first rate version of yourself, not a second rate version of someone else.’ (Judy Garland)
She has certainly achieved that, as she is unique!
I was attracted by a line from an old Japanese poem “If all the world are brothers, why are wind and waves so restless”. It made me think of all the problems, national repression, skirmishes and wars that we have today in the Middle East, Ethiopia, Myanmar, and several other countries. Peace is a very fragile thing, elusive, and we must still seek to resolve our differences.
I went to Myanmar, or Burma as it was called, some 40 years ago on the back of a UNDP project, and despite catching a bad dose of typhus fever and the plane falling out of the sky some ten days after I flew out for treatment, I went back for a few trips and got to know the country and the politics a little better.
Myanmar has been in the hands of the Burmese military ever since independence from British colonial rule in 1947. Even though Aung San Suu Kyi, the daughter of the independence movement leader, Aung San, who was assassinated at the beginning, won a clear mandate in 2010, increasing ten years later, the military maintained an over-riding hand.
Perhaps Burma’s problems started in 1962 when Ne Win exercised a military coup and for the next 20 or so years effectively shut the borders and ran the country into poverty. He tried to monetise the currency only for it to deteriorate further which led to the 1988 strikes and unrest.
Suu Kyi, or the Lady as she is known, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for her stand over democratic freedoms while undergoing house arrest. The house arrest was relaxed and when her organisation the National League for Democracy (NLD) was allowed to stand in the election of 2010 it won a clear majority. The military still retained, however, the final say in decision-making. A number of seats in the parliament at the new capital of Nay Pyi Taw, which lies midway between the two main cities of Yangon (Rangoon) and Mandalay, are held by them. In other words, the NLD could govern subject to military approval.
This has lasted for a few years until the fairly recent Rohingya problem, but we need to go back in history a while to understand the roots of the problem. In the 19th century, the British had to bring in Bengalis from India, much as in Malaya, to help develop the estates, plantations. These people practised Islam which was anathema to the Buddhist Burmese, or so we were told, and in 2017 a move against them by the military in terms of murder, arson and rape, effectively genocide, caused the Rohingya to flee to neighbouring Bangladesh.
The Burmese military, which is one of the largest of the region, have carried out decades of atrocities in the northeast of the country in the Shan and Kachin states, which have fought a guerrilla war with the Burmese army for decades. The war is still going on. The general who seized power in the recent coup is 64 year old Min Aung Hlaing. For a decade previously he was in charge of the guerrilla war in the northeast and so one would not expect much sympathy from him.
The trigger of the current situation was the result of the October 2020 election where Suu Kyi’s NLD party won an overwhelming majority over the pro-military USDP (United Socialist Development Party), who said the vote was fraudulent, which ‘justified’ the coup. Many NLD politicians have been taken into custody and the President of the country and the Lady, Suu Kyi, have been taken away to an unknown destination. Charges, undoubtedly trumped up, have been brought against Suu Kyi. Min Aung Hlaing says he will hold a fresh election early next year with the hope that he can ‘arrange’ a better result that would legitimise the coup! The people won’t wait that long.
The recent Armed Forces Day, a tour de force, was celebrated while over 100 people were shot and lost their lives in protests. In attendance at the event were the defence ministers of China and Russia, the main supplier of arms to the Burmese military. Myanmar is strategically very important to China, from access to Myanmar’s rich resources to also providing direct access to the many assets they now hold in several African countries. They view Myanmar as an important client country.
There has been a growing number of protests over the coup and the fall out from it, from the World’s main organisations – the UN, EU, Amnesty International and a number of major countries, including the US. They have written very stiff letters but with China and Russia being on the UN’s Security Council there is little that will be done.
Will the west just permit this creeping takeover? Will they be more forceful over Myanmar? Or will the Myanmar people sort out their big problem themselves? Alas not without outside help.
About the author:
Dr J Scott Younger
President Commissioner of Glendale Partners
and member of IFIMES Advisory Board
Dr J Scott Younger, OBE, is a professional civil engineer; he spent 42 years in the Far East undertaking assignments in 10 countries for WB, ADB, UNDP. He published many papers; he was a columnist for Forbes Indonesia and Globe Asia. He served on British & European Chamber boards and was a Vice Chair of Int’l Business Chamber for 17 years. His expertise is infrastructure and sustainable development and he takes an interest in international affairs. He is an International Chancellor of the President University, Indonesia. President Commissioner of Glendale Partners and a member of IFIMES Advisory Board. Lived and worked in Burma in 1980s.
Main picture Myanmar military temple.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own.
429 women! This year 429 women took part in the yearly paint contest in Siby, a village about one hour driving from Bamako, the capital of Mali in West-Africa. These women compete for the most beautiful natural decoration on walls, houses, grain containers or enclosures of the concessions where they live. Each year it gets more beautiful. Each year the rain washes away the beautiful decoration and the next year the women of Siby start all over again.
Sabakoro
The first time I arrived in the village to follow up the work of these women I was overly impressed by this yearly process. Each year the rain washes it all away and the next year the women paint again, like so many before them. Generations have been decorating walls and houses with natural colours they find in nature.
It is a feast for the eye to see all this creative work.
Kakala
Initiated by the Cultural Centre, Bougou Saba, 8 years ago, the competition engages the village people in making their homes a place of art. Bougou Saba wants to preserve the traditional mural art on mud houses of the people of Mandé.
The whole process, starting with the information sessions, the enrolment, the preparation of the houses, the painting itself and the deliberation of the jury engages the women’s associations of each neighbourhood, and the local and traditional authorities. The announcement of the winners and the distribution of the prices during the weekend Festival Bogo Ja in February is a major tourist attraction in the region.
Djissou
Respect for the natural environment and the traditional way of constructing with mud bricks encourages the village people to become aware of the need for them to contribute to a better and cleaner environment. Therefore the quality of sanitation around the houses is taken into account by the jury.
This year five of the most experienced women took up the challenge to pass the knowledge to the younger generation by becoming a trainer. They decided not to participate anymore in the competition but to supervise a series of workshops for women and children and teach them how to prepare the houses, trace the patters, find the colours, mix them, and apply them on the walls.
Kinye
And I decided to contribute by allowing outsiders but also future generations to know about all this by starting to make an inventory of all the 429 houses participating in the competition. When I first arrived in the village, I had the intense feeling this had to be recorded.
The next generation must know about this tradition and research must be possible. With my background as a history teacher, I immediately volunteered to make an inventory of all the works. ‘You want to go around the village and make photos of all the works with the women. Do you really want to do that?!’ Julie, the co-ordinator of the project, asked me. As if I was crazy. And yes, this was what I really wanted to do.
Djinkono
So, for 5 days I left Bamako at 6:30 in the morning to arrive at the countryside and started taking pictures. Very quickly, I started to be so impressed by the pride these women take in the result of days, or weeks of labour to make the most beautiful mural painting.
They all wanted to be on the picture. They wanted to be seen, to be recognized. Some just stopped with their household activities and you still can see the water on their clothes as they ware washing, or were cooking, peeling the peanuts, or even breast feeding. Some quickly went inside to put on their best dress though. And all of them made sure to have shoes. Being seen barefooted is clearly not done in Siby.
Carine Bormans and her husband in Siby, Mali.
Soon the rain season is going to start. And gradually the colours will all wash away. I am looking forward next year to be a privileged witness again of this creative and community process.
About the author:
Carine Ouvry-Bormans, is an experience diplomatic spouse, having lived in Kuwait, Vienna, Paris, Geneva, Nairobi, Kinshasa and now in Bamako.
In between, she worked in the HR department of the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs as a specialized trainer for expats and their partners. She is also the co-author of the book “Expat Partner. Staying Active and Finding Work”, also available in Dutch. During all these years she developed a passion for photography.
In the picture Premier of Canada, Pierre Elliott Trudeau 1975 (source Haags Gemeente museum – Gastvrijheid rond de klok)
Known to many as “The Hague’s Diplomatic Hub”, the international vocation of the Leonardo Royal Hotel Den Haag Promenadeis truly embedded in its roots. In earlier times, the hotel used to be a private royal lodge owned by the first King of the Netherlands, and later by his son – King Willem II. The name “Promenade” made its first appearance in the building’s history in 1876, with the opening of the Hôtel de la Promenade – carefully designed by architect-engineer L.A. Brouwe.
For decades, Hôtel de la Promenade was a home away from home for a great number of important people, from royals and chief of states to diplomats, politicians and VIPs. Between 1940 and 1945, as World War II swept through the Netherlands, the Hôtel faced major challenges, as its ideal location made it a sought-after target during the German occupation. Unfortunately, this had such a disastrous effect on the hotel that it was eventually decided to demolish it.
The story of this historical building, however, could not end this way. Luckily, in 1968 Bertus Meijer decided to rebuild the Promenade Hotel, which eventually re-opened its doors on January 11th, 1971 – thus starting a new era. Over the past 50 years, the Promenade has grown to become a place where boundaries are crossed and friendships from all over the world are built. Numerous remarkable international guests have sojourned at the hotel, and high-end events have been held there – endowing the Promenade Hotel with a first-class reputation as “The Hague’s Diplomatic Hub”.
Prince Henderik of Denmark 1971 Source Haags Gemeente Archief Promenade Krant
Within the first months of the opening year, Mr. Meijer had the honor of welcoming a royal guest – Prince Henrik of Denmark. In the following years, other well-known figures – including heads of state, diplomats, and international VIPs – had the opportunity to benefit from the top-class services and hospitality of the Promenade. Personalities like Nelson Mandela, George Bush, and Bill Gates are just a few of the well-known guests that have stayed at the Hotel. And surely, one of the Hotel’s highlights of the past decades was the stay of Bill Clinton, former President of the United States of America, who visited the Hotel – then known as Crowne Plaza Den Haag-Promenade – to host a reading session and to attend a special dinner during his visit to the Netherlands.
The number of diplomatic guests that have been welcomed at the Promenade Hotel is truly exceptional. Multiple prime ministers and royals from the Netherlands and abroad have been delighted to visit the Hotel or to stay there for a few nights – some of them even quite frequently. Ambassadors and representatives of an embassy would wait at the Promenade Hotel before they would present their credentials to the Dutch King or Queen. There, they would be picked up by carriage. This was an awe-inspiring sight, captivating all of those fortunate enough to witness it.
Regeringsleiders van de Nederlandse Antillen en Suriname 1976 (source Haags Gemeente archief – Gastvrijheid rond de klok)
When a great international reputation such as that of the Promenade Hotel is earned, it is extremely important to act on it. One of the many events with which the Hotel honored its name was the Sri Lanka Cultural Food Festival held in March 2004, when the Hotel collaborated with the country’s embassy in order to organize a grand celebration of the over 400-year long alliance between Sri Lanka and the Netherlands.
In 2017, these Food Festivals were revived and upgraded. The Hotel’s current General Manager, Mr. Patrick Aarsman, and Diplomat Magazine’s Publisher, Ms. Mayelinne De Lara, closely worked together to organize a variety of culinary evenings that earned the Hotel a spot in the heart of The Hague’s gastronomic scene – thus gaining a reputation as “the International Culinary Center of The Hague”.
These Food Festivals were more than just an international dining experience: in addition to the culinary element, they incorporated a display of traditions and habits from the specific countries that were celebrated. Hence, every Festival was aimed at delivering a complete and unique experience of the represented country – to the pleasure of the invited participants, who would travel to The Hague from all corners of the world.
Today, Leonardo Royal Hotel Den Haag Promenade still proudly features the international perspective that has characterized the Hotel since its creation. From the guests to the cuisine, from its traditions to its events, the Promenade Hotel overcomes obstacles and happily welcomes guests from all around the world.
Growing up in The Netherlands in the second half of the 20th century, a generally left leaning liberal democracy, I came to believe that democracy with all its faults and drawbacks is generally good and that dictatorships are always bad, be they fascist, communist or nihilist. This view was reinforced by the aftermath of the Second World War and the Cold War.
Sure the great democracies had done and at times still did despicable things and made terrible mistakes, but given time bad leaders were exposed, rooted out or elected out. On the whole they appeared to strive for ‘the greatest good for the greatest number of people’. In general people trusted that. But slowly cracks in this world view appeared. In many cases the greatest number of people turned out to be the greatest number of like-coloured, like-believing, heterosexual, male people.
In most ‘Western’ countries this view is now fortunately changing, albeit way too slowly. In many countries and in some US states it is still not. Also, by showing that they are democratic, adult democracies develop Byzantian bureaucracies, resulting in slow and pondering decision making. By contrast dictatorships or absolutist governments can get things done.
‘Baron’ Haussmann was only able to change the layout of Paris and create its famous Boulevards because in the beginning of the reign of Napoleon III, he was almost an absolute monarch. Hitler could build the Autobahn system and, back in time, Chinese emperors could build the greatest wall on earth. And, speaking of the Chinese, the eye-popping growth of China’s development, wealth and resulting power could not have happened in a real democracy with adherence to the rule of law.
Much as most people (this writer included) in Western democracies becry China’s treatment of Tibetans, Uighurs and members of the Falung Gong, its system is undeniably very successful in providing the greatest – material – good to the greatest number of – Han Chinese – people. Could it be that countries that need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps are better served by an absolute system?
Compare the development of China with that of India, the largest democracy on the planet, which in the first decennia of its independence was governed by men who were trained in the (Fabian) socialist environments of Cambridge and Oxford and were more idealistic than practical. India has also made big strides, but its development was incomparably slower. Look also at the development of South Korea and Taiwan, both poor and war torn in 1945. Under their initial dictatorships their economies grew rapidly until in the nineties their populations had become so sophisticated and influenced by travel and education abroad that they morphed into successful democracies.
Could it be that for a country with a primitive economy, plagued by perennial food shortages and widespread poverty, the best way to rapidly provide for this greatest good for the greatest number of people an authoritarian system works best? And that it will work well until its population is sufficiently secure, educated and internationally oriented to demand personal justice and their political voice to be heard?
By Vangelis Vitalis, New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s Deputy Secretary, Trade and Economic. Through 2021 he is also APEC Senior Officials’ Meeting chair.
New Zealand is hosting Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) in 2021. Three years of planning went into producing a physical event that would have brought 20,000 people to New Zealand.
By mid-2020 it was anticipated the COVID-19 pandemic might stop a handful of economies from attending, and work began on introducing a virtual aspect to the meetings so economies that couldn’t travel could still take part. Those plans quickly became the foundation for the first ever fully virtual APEC, with New Zealand announcing in July that the entire year would take place virtually.
COVID-19 forced our economy, APEC’s second-smallest by GDP, to rewrite our script and become one of the guinea pigs for digital diplomacy.
Why not postpone APEC 2021 and wait for things to get better? The work facing our 21 economies was too important to shelve.
Instead, New Zealand worked with Malaysia, which became the trailblazer for virtual APEC meetings when it made the shift online partway through its 2020 host year. They generously shared their lessons with New Zealand, and it has been up to us to build on them.
Across the year, New Zealand will host hundreds of meetings with thousands of delegates. Many will be happening at the same time, and it is up to us as hosts to ensure the right people are in the right meetings, that they are engaged, that the process is seamless, and that they still get that sense of New Zealand.
While physical APEC meetings tend to run for 2-3 days at six hours a day, and that can be hard going in a virtual environment. So a lot of work has gone into structuring our meetings, and bringing them down to manageable three-hour blocks.
We’re using digital technology in innovative ways, aiming to replicate the experiences and personal connections that APEC delegates, Ministers and Leaders encounter in a physical hosting year. This includes making time and virtual space available for in-person and small group discussions, and using digital content to welcome, host and farewell our guests and to showcase Aotearoa’s landscape and dynamic economy.
Hosting virtually has also allowed us to be more inclusive in our engagement – widening our reach to include a range of experts and stakeholders who might not ordinarily be able to travel and attend APEC meetings in an in-person host year.
Despite the pressure of having less than 6 months to restructure, regroup and embark down a fully virtual path, there was a collective drive to make it work – because it had to work. APEC’s primary goal is to support sustainable economic growth and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific, to help turn policy initiatives into concrete results and tangible benefits for the region. This work is more important than ever as we respond to the challenges of COVID-19.
This year APEC is working on a regional response to COVID-19; including measures to allow medical supplies and vaccines to be easily traded across borders, and to ensure key supply routes remain open.
And as a forum, APEC must think about not only the short-term response to COVID-19, but also a sustained and sustainable long-term response.
That long-term thinking is reflected in the work that will contribute to APEC’s agenda for the next two decades.
Last year, APEC Leaders adopted the Putrajaya Vision 2040, which will become a 20-year roadmap – a living document that will change and evolve with the region. Officials from all 21 economies are now working on a plan that will bring it to life by outlining the concrete steps economies will take towards fulfilment of the Vision. It is crucial work that will help drive prosperity through innovation, sustainable and inclusive growth, and trade and investment.
As APEC 2021 progresses, so will our work to improve what we do and how we do it.
Can diplomacy take place through a webcam? Absolutely.
Will virtual meetings replace physical meetings altogether? It’s unlikely – however, they open a door to the possibility of a hybrid physical-and-virtual model which is more inclusive, and more environmentally sustainable.
As host of APEC 2021 it is on New Zealand to create an environment where people can join, work and grow together; to facilitate, build and advance relationships between economies, and turn policy initiatives into tangible results.
This is a crucial moment for our region and this valuable institution that we all care about deeply. It is a driver of economic and trade growth, jobs, income, innovation, regional integration and cooperation.
As host of APEC 2021 it is our job to not only support this important work, but to contribute to a long legacy in a way that makes APEC strong, more resilient, and even better prepared for whatever the future holds.
