| Settling An Historical Debt As a Prerequisite To Build a Better World |
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The purpose of this essay is to show that: one, an historical debt exists, which is owed by the rich and developed countries of the North (Western Europe and North America) to the poor and underdeveloped countries of the South (Africa, Latin America and Asia); and two, unless that historical debt is paid back in part (given its magnitude, it would be impossible to reimburse it in full), humanity will not be able to build a ‘better world’, that is, a viable and sustainable world, in which sufficient levels of justice, liberty and peace exist.
Two essential and crucial questions are: What is that historical debt made up of? And: When was it contracted? The answer to the first one is: That historical debt has two parts: material and moral. The material part is made up by the sum-total of all the human and natural resources that were forcibly taken (or stolen, to call a spade a spade) by the rich and developed countries of the North from the poor and underdeveloped countries of the South. The moral part is made up by an enormous amount of pain and suffering that was inflicted on the populations of the poor and underdeveloped countries of the South by the rich and developed countries of the North while incurring that historic debt. The answer to the second question is: That historical debt was contracted during the last three to four centuries, during the three historical periods known as slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism. Therefore, assuming that the hypothesis outlined above is true (as I believe it is), the wealth and development of the rich and developed countries, and the poverty and underdevelopment of the poor and underdeveloped countries, are, to a significant extent, linked. In other words, the rich and developed countries are rich and developed because, to a significant extent, the poor and underdeveloped countries are poor and underdeveloped.
Unfortunately, a clear recognition of that historical debt is still largely lacking in the rich and developed countries whose leaders continue to prevaricate (in that they are not unlike the proverbial three monkeys who, having shut their ears, eyes and mouths, refuse to hear and to see what is happening, and keep silent about it). So (to use that shop-worn metaphor once more), the Titanic may well be slowly sinking into the black and icy waters of the Atlantic, but the orchestra goes on playing on the deck, while some of the guests, impeccably attired in their best clothes go on dancing. Gandhi correctly observed that an essential problem in the world in which we live is the ‘discrepancy’ between ‘word, creed and deed’.(2 Building a ‘better world’ requires getting rid of that discrepancy. To save the world from a catastrophe ‘foretold’,(3 what was forcibly taken (stolen) by the rich and developed countries of the North from the poor and underdeveloped countries of the South must be returned. II It can be posited with some degree of confidence that the degree of ‘civilisation’ (not culture) that exists in a given society, or nation, and in international relations, is measured by the levels of justice and liberty (and peace) therein. Two important remarks need to be made at this juncture. One has to do with the distance that always separates the theory from the practice; the other, with the problem of placement of justice and liberty on a spectrum, or scale, of priority. Obviously, It is one thing to have beautiful principles on paper (The American Constitution and the Bill of Rights, for example, or the Universal Declaration of Human Rights), and quite another, their reality or application on the ground. No country in the world (not even Scandinavian countries which are probably the most advanced in that respect) is so perfect that it can be exempted from that caveat. But the distance between the countries in which justice and liberty (and human rights) are meaningful concepts, and those in which they are not, is enormous. The bitter truth is that, today, only a small fraction of the world’s population live under conditions that can be, albeit remotely, called democratic. The large majority live under, either tyrannies or dictatorships (military or otherwise), or under authoritarian and oligarchic regimes (sometimes camouflaged as democracies) which either do not respect human rights, or they do only sporadically, when it suits them, or in ‘normal’ times, as opposed to, in times of crisis. Recently, a timid first step was taken by the international community to correct that situation. It was decided at the United Nations’ Summit of September 2005 (the 60th Anniversary Summit) that, henceforth, the UN will have the right to intervene forcefully (manu militari if necessary) in cases of extremely grave violations of human rights -- such as, civil war, genocide and ethnic cleansing. That is a good beginning. Nevertheless, it must be acknowledged that, in a world dominated by a single superpower (and a planet peppered by military bases belonging to that superpower, apparently there are 780 presently), might is still, to a large extent, right. Second remark. Admittedly, both justice and liberty are indispensable, but which comes first, or should come first? Or, put differently, is one the precondition of the other? I believe that, indeed, in the contemporary world, one is the precondition of the other, and that is justice that comes first, largely because, without it, liberty loses much of its substance; whereas the presence of liberty does not guarantee justice (as the American case study indicates clearly, see the following paragraph). In the past, justice (and peace) could be, and were, imposed by force, and liberty did not exist for the dominated peoples of the world. Pax Romana and Pax Brittanica are good examples of that situation. But, in our time and age, as the difficulties of the United States to impose a Pax Americana show, that is no longer the case. Justice and liberty (and peace) cannot be arbitrarily imposed, even by a superpower as powerful as the United States. But, as the Balkan conflict of the 1990s showed, they can be imposed multilaterally, when there is an international consensus that intervention is both necessary and legitimate; that is, when there is an international consensus that there exists, in a given country or region, an extremely serious case of human rights violations (like genocide and ethnic cleansing). What happens when liberty is put first, and not justice? The American case study is very instructive in that respect. In the United States liberty comes first. The word ‘Liberty’ (in addition to the phrase ‘In God We Trust’) is written on all the American coins (from one cent to half-dollar) -- not ‘Justice’. ‘Liberty’ here is politically defined and means, very largely, independence (America was for a long time a British colony). ‘Liberty’ that is socially defined is often referred to as ‘freedom’. In the United States the latter means, largely, ‘freedom to undertake’ (similarly, ‘equality’ means ‘equality of opportunity’). Some analysts, to describe the importance of freedom in America, have observed that in the US what is not specifically forbidden by the law is (implicitly) considered to be authorised. That very broad acceptance, or understanding, of freedom in America has had in the past, and continues to have in the present, a very positive side, or implication: it has played, and continues to play, a significant role in the American dynamism, creativity and productivity. In Europe (and, I imagine, largely, in the rest of the world), it is rather the opposite: what is not specifically permitted by the law is considered to be forbidden. That probably explains, to a certain extent, the somewhat lower levels of European dynamism, creativity and productivity.(4 But there is a price to be paid for this -- ‘the other side of the coin’, the negative side, so to speak -- which Americans have always been willing to pay for that very high level of freedom. That price is, I believe, having to live in a land of more pronounced extremes and (growing) inequalities. The US can even be seen (in the philosophical sense, of course, and not in the legal sense) as, relatively, a land little justice. The present situation in the United States is one of pretty dismal poverty co-existing with indecently fabulous wealth – and a dwindling middle class (according to the latest statistics, some 13 per cent, or some 43 million people, live under the poverty line). So: What is happening to the ‘American Dream’? Is it still a ‘Dream’, or is it slowly turning into a ‘Nightmare’? Inevitably, and not only for the Americans, but also for the rest of the world, the ‘American Dream’ is, slowly, turning into a ‘Planetary Nightmare’, because its dogged pursuit means consumption levels that are in the long run unsustainable, and the whole world must suffer the consequences. A related problem is that Americans have been, for a very long time, living beyond their means. The American trade deficit keeps growing and has reached some $ 600 billion a year. This is about 5 per cent of the American GDP. How much longer will the rest of the world acquiesce to finance that deficit by buying American treasury bonds? It is, essentially unfair situation (which is, admittedly, used, or exploited, by some other rising powers …)? Certainly not forever. One day, sooner or later, the day of reckoning will come, in the form of a planetary economic crisis, and, not only the Americans, but the whole world will suffer. (5 In the following three sections I shall present, very briefly, some of the most salient facts of slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism, the three historical periods during which the rich and developed countries contracted their historical debt to the poor and underdeveloped countries. III In sub-Saharan Africa the Portuguese were the first to embark upon the slave trade. The latter started slowly in the middle of the 16th century, but accelerated at the beginning of the following century, and from 1646 up until 1790, it grew exponentially. The main reason for the slave trade to grow by leaps and bounds was the rising demand for cheap labour in the sugar, coffee, cotton and tobacco plantations of the New World -- that is, in the American continent and the Caribbean region. Spain, France, Netherlands and United Kingdom soon joined the Portuguese. But the British rapidly supplanted its rivals. By 1672, the Royal African Company chartered by King Charles II of England became the richest shipper of human slaves to the mainland of the Americas. Slavery on American soil grew at a very fast rate. By 1750, 200,000 African slaves were working in the plantations. Fifty years later, that number grew to 700,000. By 1768, the English slave trade was shipping 53,000 slaves a year to the North American continent -- while the French shipped 23,000, the Dutch 11,000, and the Portuguese 8,700. The annual total was, thus, close to 100,000 slaves. It is estimated that some ten million slaves made the ‘Middle Passage’ voyage (crossing the Atlantic), during the three centuries or so that the slave trade lasted. (6 A remarkable conference was held recently at Yale University, entitled ‘Repairing the Past: Confronting the Legacies of Slavery, Genocide and Caste’. (7 The conference upholds the principle of reparation, or compensation, of African-Americans for the terrible wrongs suffered by their ancestors who were slaves. The debate revolves around two very important questions: What obligation does the present owe the past? And: Who or what decides the form and substance of the reparation? I present below a number of (I believe) very significant quotes from the papers presented at that conference (quotes which I will use again in the concluding section of this essay): ‘Repairing the past involves a large number of interrelated and complex issues that have to do with history, memory and justice’. ‘Historical injustices can cast a long shadow.’ ‘Aristotle (in Ethics) presents reparative justice as the restoration of a moral state of equality that was violated by injustice.’ ‘If there are persisting ill effects of a wrongful action, and the perpetrator is in a position to rectify them in some measure, she ought to repair the situation in which she has placed the victim.’ ‘This is not a matter of collective guilt but of collective responsibility; and reparation is not a matter of collective punishment but of collective liability.’ ‘There are causal links between past oppression and present situation.’ ‘Reparations are a limited means of “materially” repairing the effects of massive, systematic injustices.’ ‘The central aim of the reparations movement is to help “the poorest of the poor” break the cycle of poverty and discrimination.’ ‘Collective compensation is the responsibility of the US citizens as such.’ ‘The American government which for a long time tolerated slavery and passed and enforced laws that supported it is responsible …’ ‘Reparations harbor the potential of … reshaping our public memory and re-moralizing our political culture.’ ‘What the successors of victims want and need is relief from the (present) disadvantages.’ ‘(Reparations should be) paid into collective funds intended to redress the legacy of centuries of legally institutionalised injustice.’ ‘The most appropriate form of compensation, it seems, should be oriented to needs and relationships in the present and the future.’ I find the degree of relevance of the quotes above to the subject matter of this essay absolutely stunning. ‘Restitution’, ‘reparation’ and ‘compensation’ are similar or comparable concepts. I shall go back to that relevance, and further comment on it in the last and concluding part of this essay, but not before dealing briefly with ‘colonialism’ and ‘neo colonialism’. IV A very good (and shocking) introduction to the ‘reality’ of colonialism is, paradoxically, Joseph Conrad’s novella, Heart of Darkness, which, of course, is fiction, but fiction based on reality : Conrad visited the Belgian Congo and the story, a terrible story, is based on what he saw there. Some scholars think that the model for Conrad’s Mr. Kurtz, the unbelievably cruel and morally corrupt (he had a corrupt soul, which is the worst) ivory trader was the (Belgian) ‘state agent’ Captain Léon Rom who worked for the colonial administration. In the early years of its colonisation (from 1880 to 1908), the Congo was the personal property of King Leopold of Belgium. In a recent article that appeared in the New York Review of Books, Adam Hochschild writes: ‘Fearful of tropical diseases, the King never visited his prized possession. Instead, while living in Brussels, on his yacht, or in several luxurious villas on the French Riviera, he made a huge fortune off the Congo, conservatively estimated as at least $ 1.1 billion in today’s dollars. In the early years, most of the money came from ivory … From the early 1890s on, the major source of Leopold’s Congo wealth was rubber … Troops from the King’s private army came into village after village and held the women hostage in order to make the men go deep into the forest to gather their monthly quota of rubber … Many men were worked to death, while the women hostages were starved … Famine spread . During two decades of widespread but unsuccessful rebellions more people died … The greatest toll came as soldiers … moved throughout the country, bringing new diseases to people with no resistance to them … All these caused the death of millions.’ This led to serious population decline : ‘Like most other indigenous peoples who fell victim to rapid conquest, from Native Americans to Australian Aborigines, the Congolese suffered huge losses … Major Charles C. Liebrechts, a long-time high colonial official, estimated the same year (1920) that since the beginning of colonisation, the territory’s overall population had been cut in half. … (T)his would suggest a loss of some ten million people.’ To be entirely honest, the Belgians did, mostly after 1920, some good things. Hochschild writes: ‘The Belgians also built the rudiments of a good public health network …Needing literate workers, they built what may have been colonial Africa’s best network of primary schools … -- Higher education (however) was scant and came late.’ They also built some railways. When it became independent in 1960, ‘only three of some five thousand senior officials in the Congo’s civil service were Congolese.’ (8 An (academic) definition of colonialism is that it was ‘a racially-based system of political, economic and cultural domination’. That system was forcibly imposed and depended for its existence on economic exploitation and political oppression. The four pillars of colonialism were: the soldier, the administrator, the trader and the missionary. The white ‘settlers’ expropriated vast areas of the best farm land from the indigenous peoples. Colonies were not organised to develop independent African nation-states. Only five per cent of the Africans were educated in missionary schools. The legacy of colonialism continues to contribute to the instability and fragility of the African states. The most autocratic phase of colonial rule lasted roughly from 1885 to 1945 – the ‘Partition of Africa’ took place at the Berlin Conference of 1884-85. Formal independence began in sub-Saharan Africa in 1957 (when Ghana became independent); most of the other sub-Saharan African colonies followed suit in the early-1960s. The political cause of colonialism was the building of empires that flattered the national egos of the colonial powers. But the most important reasons were economic: the desire to acquire and control new markets, and to obtain cheaply raw materials and primary products. The military conquest was not easy. Armed African resistance was often fierce. Two examples: the Shona-Ndebele uprising in Zimbabwe, in 1895; and the Zulus of Natal who took up arms against the British, in 1906. (9 Walter Rodney, in his influential book published in the mid-1960s, How Europe underdeveloped Africa, contends that under colonialism: ‘the only thing that developed were dependency and underdevelopment’, and ‘The only positive development in colonialism was when it ended.’ Under imperial rule African economies were structured to be permanently dependent on Western nations. They were consigned the role of producers of primary products for processing in the West. In disrupting pre-colonial political systems that worked for Africans and imposing alien models, colonialism laid the seeds of a political crisis that continues today. By redrawing of the map of Africa, throwing diverse people together without consideration for established borders, ethnic conflicts were created that are now destabilising the continent. The new nation-states were artificial and many were too small to be viable. Fewer than a third of the countries in Africa have populations of more than 10 million. Western multi-party democracy imposed by colonial powers polarised African societies. ‘It was the introduction of party politics by colonial administration that set off the fire of ethnic conflicts in Nigeria,’ The notion that colonialism was a civilising mission is a myth - the system was propelled by Europe’s economic and political self- interest. To meet their economic and administrative needs colonial powers built some infrastructure, like railway to carry export commodities, and they educated a few Africans to help them run the colonies. But nowhere in Africa were positive contributions made to any substantial extent. Countries like Nigeria and Ghana, which were among the better endowed colonies, were left with only a few rail lines, rudimentary infrastructure and a few thousand graduates. This was better than others. For instance, in 1975, Mozambique had only three dozen graduates. V In 1961, at the All-African People’s Conference held in Cairo, neo-colonialism was defined as ‘the survival of the colonial system in spite of the formal recognition of political independence in emerging countries which become the victims of an indirect and subtle form of domination by political, economic, social, military or technical means.’ An interesting concept in that respect is that of ‘hegemony’. Antonio Gramsci defined hegemony as an order in which a certain way of life and thought is dominant. That dominant ideology permeates every facet of human existence - taste, morality, customs, religious and political principles. Virtually every nation in the world, whether colonised or not, has had to deal with western hegemony. The relevance of this concept of ‘hegemony’ to ‘globalisation’ is striking. Without it would be impossible to disseminate effectively the western values of materialism and consumerism. So, according to this ‘classical’ Marxist (and neo-Marxist) analysis of neo-colonialism, political independence is only partial independence. Full or real independence requires economic independence. African nations are currently virtually all (with the partial exception of South Africa) in a neo-colonialist phase: ‘a new form of imperial rule designed to give the former colonies the illusion of independence’. (11 Today, all the big and influential concepts/issues that dominate the political, economic, social and cultural discourse (or the international ‘agenda’) – globalisation, liberalisation, development, markets, democracy, human rights, and so on – are of Western origin. Three attitudes are possible vis-à-vis that situation: one, wholehearted acceptance and adoption -- that attitude can be said to be represented by the World Economic Forum (WEF), and within it, by the multinational companies (MNCs), and the governments of the rich and developed countries of the world; two, wholehearted rejection -- that attitude can be said to be represented by the World Social Forum (WSF), and within it, the civil society (non-governmental organisations, or NGOs); and three, an attitude that is a mixture, or a combination, of the previous two – the supporters of that attitude try to choose what is good or valid in the other two attitudes. Historically and logically that third approach is the best one and should triumph in the end. But will it come to pass, given the single-mindedness with which the promoters of the first two attitudes pursue their respective goals, and the confrontational mood that prevails presently? Can the attempts by the WEF to co-opt aspects of the WSF, by developing a social ‘agenda’, be considered as an honest search or exploration of a viable third way? Or is it another means to pursue its agenda of globalisation? The WSF deeply mistrusts the motivations and sincerity of the WEF and is unwilling to make concessions. So, ultimately, the question is: Can and will the forces and supporters of the WEF and of the WSF succeed in meeting somewhere in the middle, achieving a kind of Aristotelian ‘Golden’ mean that will be the best that can be accomplished for everybody? And, if yes, what does that involve? The fate of the world may depend on the answer to that question, and I shall go back to it in the next, concluding, section VI of this essay. But before I do that, it would not be redundant, I feel, to briefly introduce the concept of ‘unequal terms of (international) exchange’ which is closely associated with neo-colonialism. The concept – which was first coined, in the early-1960s, by Raoul Prebisch, who was the first administrator of UNCTAD (the United Nations Commission for Trade and Development) -- means that the raw materials and primary products (commodities) of the poor and underdeveloped countries -- copper, tin, coffee, tea, cocoa, cotton, etc. – were bought by the rich and developed countries at very low prices, while the manufactured products of the latter were sold to the former at very high prices. That situation has continued in the forty years or so since the beginning of the neo-colonial period, and its correction is one of the important demands of the poor and underdeveloped countries in the run-up to the December ‘Ministerial’ Summit of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in Hong Kong. VI As mentioned above, I find that the ideas discussed at the Yale University Conference, ‘Repairing the Past: Confronting the Legacies of Slavery, Genocide and Caste’, are extremely relevant to the subject matter of this essay. If, today, the principle of reparation, or compensation (or ‘restitution’, in other words), of African-Americans for the terrible wrongs suffered by their ancestors who were slaves is generally accepted in the United States as legitimate, I do not see a reason why the same principle cannot be applied to the ‘historical debt’ owed by the rich and developed countries to the poor and underdeveloped countries as well. It is entirely logical that the latter too should be ‘compensated’ for the wrongs they suffered during the three or four centuries of slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism. For the following reasons. ‘History, memory and justice’ demand it. ‘There are causal links between past oppression and present situation.’ The world will never know peace and harmony until this is done. There will be, otherwise ‘persisting ill effects of a wrongful action.’ And, therefore, ‘This is not a matter of collective guilt but of collective responsibility, and reparation is not a matter of collective punishment, but of collective liability.’ The rich and developed countries should be aware that ‘Reparations are a limited means of “materially” repairing the effects of massive, systematic injustices.’ ‘The central aim of the reparations movement is to help “the poorest of the poor” break the cycle of poverty and discrimination.’ ‘Reparations harbor the potential of … reshaping … public memory and re-moralizing political culture.’ ‘What the successors of victims want and need is relief from the (present) disadvantages.’ ‘(Reparations should be) paid into collective funds intended to redress the legacy of centuries of legally institutionalised injustice.’ ‘The most appropriate form of compensation, it seems, should be oriented to needs and relationships in the present and the future.’ (12 Dr Zeki Ergas ~ STWR Member Founder and Executive Secretary of Millennium Solidarity Geneva Group (MSGG), www.millennium-solidarity.net, and the Secretary General of International PEN’s Swiss Romand Center, www.penromand.ch NOTES: 1) This essay is part of a series that tries to address what is probably the most important question faced by humanity today: How to build a ‘better world’. Some of the titles in the series are: ‘Why Civil Disobedience Campaigns Are Necessary to Eradicate Extreme Poverty in the World’, ‘Extreme Poverty, Extreme Wealth: Are the Two Linked?’, ‘No More War’, ‘Decline and Fall of the American Empire’, Women and a Better World’, ‘Waging War on Corruption’ and ‘The Deterioration of Democracy: Has It Become a One-way Street?’ The essays, and some of the reactions to them, have been collected in a www.peacejournalism.com file. 2) Cf. Louis Fischer, Gandhi. The Life and message for the World (New York, 1954) 3) Famous term coined by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I also like to quote Albany’s prophecy in King Lear, ‘Humanity must per force prey on itself, like monsters of the deep’. 4) The United States leads in the number of Nobel prizes won in science – physics, chemistry, medicine … – and in the number patents in innovations and technology. But China and India are gaining ... 5) The treasury bills bought, these days, by the Chinese – and the Japanese. 6) I visited a large number of websites to research the subjects of slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism. 7) The conference was organised jointly by the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance and Abolition at Yale University, and the Brown University’s Committee on Slavery and Justice, on October 27-29, 2005. Among the papers presented: Thomas McCarthy, ‘Remarks on the Morality and Politics of Reparations for Slavery’; Janna Thompson, Memory and the Ethics of Reparation’; Pablo de Geiff, ‘Addressing the Past: Reparations for Gross Human Rights Abuses,; and Mary F. Berry, ‘The Continuing Significance of Reparations …’ 8) See Adam Hochschild, ‘In the Heart of Darkness’, in, The NYRB (Vol 52, No.15, October 6, 2005). In Francis Ford Coppola’s great film on the Vietnam War, Apocalypse Now, a demented Green Beret officer, played hauntingly by Marlon Brando, is also called Kurtz .. 9) Cf. Tunde Obadina, ‘The myth of Neo-colonialism’, published in the Net, is a good and balanced treatment of the subject. 10) Obadina, doc. cit. 11) Idem 12) To build a ‘better world’, qualitative/structural changes are needed. Some are specific and have to do with the relations between the rich and poor countries. Others are general and have to do with the major challenges to human civilisation. The specific changes are, inter alia: A)The unconditional and immediate abolition of all debt owed by the poor countries; B)A massive investment program in the economies -- agriculture, industry and services -- of the poor countries (a kind of Global Marshall Plan), representing, to begin with, one per cent of the rich countries GNI -- which should be increased rapidly to two per cent (possibly, in a period of ten years); C)An international trade that would reverse the ‘unequal terms of exchange’ of the past, guaranteeing thus a decent income for the small farmers, workers and small businessmen of the poor countries; D)Good governance, not only in the poor countries, but also in the rich countries. Let us not forget that corruption is of two sorts: grand and petty. The facilitators of grand corruption are in the rich countries. Grand corruption simply could not exist without their collaboration. As for petty corruption, it is -- like the informal sector -- a means of survival in the poor countries. Petty corruption tends to decrease with economic development. The general changes are, inter alia: I)The abolition of war as a means of international conflict resolution. War must be the solution of the last resort and the authority for waging it must rest with a world parliament or government. Ultimately, there should be only one army in the world. II)The complete abolition of all nuclear weapons. And not only stopping their proliferation. As long as an exclusive club of countries claims for itself the right of having them, while refusing that right to others (an understandably unacceptable position for those who are outside the ‘Club’) that problem will not be solved. III)Ethical authority. ‘Market economy’, ‘democracy’ and ‘liberalism’ should not be taken to mean that ‘anything goes’ to make a profit. Especially worrying are: the manipulation of information by a world media controlled by a few ‘media barons’ /giant corporations; and the (sex)exploitation of the ‘consumers’ by degrading (for the women) and misleading publicity (commercials). Establishing National Committees of Wise Men could be a way to check this discrepancies. IV)Limits to wealth and income. Almost everything that has any value in life and the world has limits: joy and sorrow, pain and pleasure, happiness and despair. For a more detailed treatment, see my essays: ‘Why Civil Disobedience Campaigns Will Be Necessary for the Eradication of Extreme Poverty in the World’ and ‘Extreme Wealth, Extreme Poverty: Are the Two Linked?’ in www.peacejournalism.com Copyright peacejournalism.com
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