Ai Weiwei, Joan Baez win top Amnesty International award
Published by Amnesty International, March 24, 1015 Legendary folk singer Joan Baez and world-renowned artist Ai Weiwei – both committed activists – will be the joint recipients of Amnesty International’s Ambassador of Conscience Award for 2015, the human rights organization announced today. Amnesty International’s Ambassador of Conscience Award is the [...]
The Women are Coming, and They Mean Peace: Historic March Across Korean DMZ Announced
By Andrea Germanos, Published by Common Dreams, March 11, 2015 A group of global women aims to wage peace with a milestone walk across the 155-mile demilitarized zone (DMZ) that separates North and South Korea, and a call for an end to the state of war that has affected millions [...]
President urges peaceful vote as Nigeria aims to consolidate its democracy amid risks
By Michelle Faul, March 27, 2015, Published in Associated Press ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) — Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan urged his nation to vote peacefully and accept the results of Saturday's presidential elections, which analysts say will be the most tightly contested in the history of Africa's richest nation and its [...]
Tunisia Is Still a Success
by Larry Diamond, March 23, 2015, published in The Atlantic TUNIS, TUNISIA—Last Wednesday’s savage terrorist attack in Tunis targeted the one country that has delivered on the promise of the Arab Spring by producing a real—and surprisingly liberal—democracy. In every other Arab country swept by mass pro-democracy protests in 2011 and 2012, [...]
Oakland: The Rev. James Lawson, a longtime nonviolent activist, practices what he preaches
By Lou Fancher Correspondent, March 2015, published in News Digest on Nonviolent Conflict OAKLAND -- The use of violence as a means to gain freedom or to protect a citizenship never fulfills its promises to humanity, the Rev. James Lawson said. "World War I was a call for democracy, but [...]
Resisting ISIS
By Maria J. Stephan, April 2015, published in Sojourners JULY 2013 in Raqqa, the first city liberated from regime control in northeastern Syria, a Muslim schoolteacher named Soaad Nofal marched daily to ISIS headquarters. She carried a cardboard sign with messages challenging the behaviors of members of the Islamic State of [...]