Friday, September 22, 2000
The University Daily Kansan
Section A · Page 7
U.N. aid workers rally
Workers demand more protection
GENEVA — About 1,500 mostly U.N. aid workers wearing white arm bands and carrying photographs of slain and abducted colleagues marched yesterday to demand more protection while working in some of the world's most dangerous places.
The Associated Press
"Refugees' lives depend on us, but they can depend on us only if we stay alive," Sadako Ogata, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said at the Geneva rally to protest the killing of four UNHCR workers killed this month — three in West Timor and one in Guinea — and the abduction of a fifth.
Around the globe, UNHCR and
other U.N. workers took part in memorial services, rallies and marches to remember their colleagues and insist that such attacks should never be allowed to happen again.
In New York, the U.N. flag was lowered to half mast and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan led some 1,200 marchers in a minute of silence in memory of the victims, whom he called "heroes who worked to save lives."
Workers from the UNHCR head office in Geneva wore white arm bands in solidarity at a memorial service for the latest victim, Mensah Kpognon, who was killed in Guinea on Sunday.
The demonstrators maintain that unarmed humanitarian workers often are asked to go to places where governments were unwilling even to send peacekeeping troops.
Kpognon was the 15th U.N. civilian to die this year, and the 198th since January 1992. The majority were killed in shootings, bombings or ethnic violence.
"We want to live and not to be killed. We are aid workers, not martyrs," Naveed Hussain, head of the UNHCR staff association, told the Geneva rally.
In a message, Annan backed the workers' demands.
"Words fail us at a time like this," Annan said. "They fail to express our outrage at the senseless violence against a humanitarian worker whose sole purpose was to help people in need.
"But words must not fail us in the message we send today to the world and to member states of the United Nations. This message must be clear and unequivocal — failure to protect the lives of innocent and unarmed humanitarian workers is unacceptable."
Whaling controversy continues
The Associated Press
TOKYO — Beer flowed and cheers went up yesterday as a ship pulled into port carrying Japan's latest ocean catch — 88 whales.
The nation, which consumes whales both cooked and raw as a delicacy, remains unabashedly defiant before growing international criticism, defending the hunt as scientific research.
Next year, Japan plans to catch up to 160 whales — and much of the meat will end up in upscale restaurants.
"All they think is that whales are cute," fisheries official Masayuki Komatsu said derisively of Westerners at a ceremony aboard the ship, the Nisshin Maru.
Japan's hunt has drawn international ire. The United States punished Japan last week by denying it some fishing rights in U.S. waters and launched an investigation that could lead to trade sanctions.
The International Whaling Commission banned commercial whaling in the mid-1980s but allows whaling countries to kill whales for research to gather information on migration, eating patterns and pollution levels.
The Nissin Maru and its fleet of research vessels brought back in a refrigerated hull 88 whales caught and killed in the northwest Pacific Ocean — 43 Bryde's whales, five sperm whales and 40 minke whales.
It was the first time in more than a decade that the catch included not just minke but also Bryde's and sperm whales — two species protected under U.S. law.
Tokyo says both are plentiful.
putting estimates at 100,000 for sperm whales and 22,000 for Bryde's whales.
The hunt is in no way endangering the species, fisheries officials say, adding that the whales are hurting the livelihoods of Japanese fishermen by eating too much fish.
Activists say the research is no more than a guise for satisfying Japan's taste for whale meat.
"They're simply trying to revive commercial whaling," said Sanae Shida of Greenpeace Japan. "Do you normally have to kill animals to do this kind of research?"
Kazuo Shima, an official with the government-linked Institute of Cetacean Research, said Japan's efforts benefit the entire world.
"This research is not just for Japan," he said. "If Japan doesn't do this research, who will?"
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