Journal

There are moments when history shows that a failure to protest human rights abuses led on to worse abuses on a much greater scale. This was true of the treatment of many groups of people in Germany and the USSR ahead of WWII, for example. And with two emerging 21st century superpowers currently deeply involved in the Sri Lankan crisis, I believe that it is crucial that we signal international disapproval and rejection of what is happening there in the wake of the defeat of the Tamil Tigers.

To declare a personal interest, a long-standing friend and colleague is closely involved in the Sri Lankan Campaign for Peace & Justice. He has asked me to help spread the word – and I am glad to do so.

The latest news on the Campaign is that three leading US human rights advocates have joined forces to urge UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, President Obama and other world leaders to put an immediate end to what they see as an imminent humanitarian catastrophe in Sri Lanka.   Professors Noam Chomsky, Rajan Menon and Michael Grodin are the latest prominent world figures to lend their support to the Sri Lanka Campaign for Peace & Justice.

The three award-winning professors come from very different academic and professional backgrounds but are united in calling world leaders to act. Announcing his support, Dr Grodin said: “At the Nuremberg Trials following the Nazi Holocaust, Justice Robert Jackson exclaimed, ‘The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored because it cannot survive their being repeated.’ These words echo and reverberate as we witness the crimes against humanity perpetrated in Sri Lanka.

According to Professor Menon: “Now is the time to settle the civil conflict in Sri Lanka, which has consumed thousands of life and brought severe misery to countless others. In the short term, access should be provided to the UN and international relief agencies to deal with the humanitarian problems facing refugees and lists of detainees should be made available. In the long run, economic development in the war torn areas must proceed hand in hand with political measures aimed at reconciliation and empowerment.”

Professor Chomsky added: “The fate of Tamils in Sri Lanka has been a shocking story of mounting horrors. It would be unconscionable to stand by in silence as the remnants face still more torture and disaster. Every effort must be expended to bring this tragedy to an end while there is still time.”

Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the International Crisis Group – who have all criticised the Tamil Tigers (LTTE) in the past – have also called for immediate action to deal with the imminent crisis affecting at least 50,000 children.

The Sri Lanka Campaign is chaired by Edward Mortimer, journalist and former Communications Director to Kofi Annan. Other members of the Advisory Council include Lakhdar Brahimi (a former high level UN envoy and member of the Elders – an independent group of global leaders, brought together by Nelson Mandela, to address difficult global challenges), Brahma Chellaney (a senior Indian foreign policy adviser), Charles Glass (the internationally renowned journalist) and Chibli Mallat (the Lebanese legal specialist) and Bianca Jagger, prominent human rights advocate, a member of the Executive Directors Leadership Council of Amnesty International USA, and a Council of Europe Goodwill Ambassador).

The Campaign calls for the following:

1. The UN, international Red Cross and voluntary agencies must be given full and unrestricted access to care for and protect the civilians in the camps, and help them return to wherever in their own country they choose to live. Meanwhile, these civilians should have their right to freedom of movement restored in time to escape the devastation that the monsoon will otherwise bring.

2. A list of all those still alive and in custody (in internment camps or elsewhere) should be published, so that families can stop searching for loved ones who are dead.

3. Those who continue to be detained as alleged LTTE combatants must be treated in accordance with the Geneva Conventions, and urgently given access to legal representation.

4. Accountability processes must be established to ensure that international aid is not diverted to purposes other than those for which it was given.

5. The Sri Lankan Government should allow conflict reconciliation specialists unhindered access to help rebuild lives and communities.

6. Sri Lanka should request or accept a full UN investigation into war crimes committed by all parties during the war.

7. The UN Secretary General should appoint a Special Envoy to Sri Lanka. For more information, please take a look here.

G500 logo

In 1989, Julia Hailes and I were elected to the UN Global 500 Roll of Honour, awarded for extraordinary environmental achievements – the highlight of which was meeting so many others around the world who had been spotlighted in the same way. Now, against a tight deadline, nominations are being invited for the successor scheme, Champions of the Earth. Any ideas?

UNEP Champions of the Earth Award honors those who, through their visionary thinking, unwavering dedication and committed action, promote the sustainable use of the planet’s resources towards global green growth. (It’s interesting that when Julia and I founded SustainAbility in 1987, with early inputs from Tom Burke, our tag-line was ‘The Green Growth Company’, building on the work I had done for an early book called The Green Capitalists.

UNEP will select a laureate for each of the following categories: Policy Leadership, Science & Innovation, Entrepreneurial Vision, and Inspiration & Action. Each laureate will receive a $40,000 prize and a specially designed trophy at an Award Ceremony and Gala Dinner to be held on 22 April, 2010 in Seoul, Republic of Korea. Nominations will be accepted until 31 October. For more information, please visit www.unep.org/champions.

Vote now and he’ll try.  See here.

I comment on the attacks by animal welfare activists on Daniel Vasella of Novartis in today’s FT online.

Exhibition of past Unilever Series installations Walking homeward

Thanks to Unilever, Elaine and I have seen a number of the Unilever Series installations at the Tate Modern, including those by Rachel Whiteread (2005), Carsten Holler (2006) and Doris Salcedo (2007) efforts, of which we liked the second and third best. Today, we were invited to see the tenth commission for the series, ‘How It Is’, by Miroslaw Balka. A sense of what it’s like can be had here.

Find myself agreeing that the scale is impressive, but the effect is slightly undermined by the fact that one end of what looks like a gigantic front-loading waste skip is open to the light, so you are never really in the void. I get the links to the Holocaust, but this didn’t feel anything like that – in the sense that there was none of the sense of coercion or forced intimacy of the cattle wagons into which people were herded. The most interesting place to experience the thing, really, was underneath, where you could hear people shuffling around above – and imagine what they were feeling and saying. We talked to an interesting Indonesian diplomat there, about the massacres in his country in the 1960s.

Sat next to some intriguing people at dinner, mainly from the advertising industry, and had found ourselves introduced to Lord (Leon) Brittan and Sir Martin Sorrell when we first arrived. Talked to the former about the restaurant where they serve you in the dark and all the waiters are blind. He didn’t like the idea one bit. We talked about the links between taste, smell and sight. Then Gavin Neath of Unilever mentioned that they had carried out research where perfectly good steaks were coloured green – and people disliked the taste, not just the colour.