Asia

*Nepal’s Maoists have relinquished control of their 19,000 fighters to government control. The young fighters wonder what’s next! The assimilation of the former fighters into society is viewed as a crucial step in Nepal’s peace process. Everyone applauds the move as constructive and the way forward. But the real work has only just begun.*

Turkish Nobel Literature Prize winner Mr. Orhan Pamuk and several other international top authors are boycotting Sri Lanka’s upcoming literary Galle Festival, following an appeal done by Reporters Without Borders. “Authors who are going would legitimize Sri Lanka’s very poor freedom of expression record,” the group says.

Akwaaba, which means “welcome,” was the first word I came across upon my arrival in Ghana. Many people identify Africa with words that have negative connotations, such as poverty, conflict or disease. However, there is much more to this vast continent than such associations. This is what I learn during my one-year visit to Ghana. I found so much hope and potential there.

As the latest development of the worldwide phenomenon of Parks of Study and Reflection, the Park at Narhi, Madhubani, Bihar, India, is also dedicated to studying and reflecting about the Human Being, the condition, and the evolutionary possibilities that allow general progress toward the establishment of a humanized non-violent world that is without discrimination of any kind.

Echo from the recent past: a letter from Humanist Association of Hong Kong that appeared in the *South China Morning Post* regarding Iran was posted on the same newspaper’s website 16 January 2011 as a side-post to the issue of sanctions against Iran for its nuclear weapons programme. As chairman of the Association I re-iterate, what programme?

Pinagpalang Kamay Association or PKAI is an NGO formed by Ms. Mina Tecson to aid two communities in need, one a poverty-stricken community in Payatas on the outskirts of Quezon City, and the other a home for abandoned physically and mentally ill children residing at Cottolengo Filipino, Montalban Rizal, quite nearby. I toured both in December 2010.

*Has the target to promote peace and non-violence ‘gone to the dogs’ I was thinking on entering the Sunday-noisy Krispy Creme café situated in up-market Bonifacio High Street at Global City, Taguig, Manila. I was to meet Patricia Carrascoso of Pets for Peace & the Labrador Retriever Owner’s Club. I was in for an awakening!*

It is a quite cold winter morning in Bihar’s Beur Central Jail, India. The jail inmates – all criminals including murderers, kidnappers and petty thieves – are ready to begin their task for the day: to learn English. The authorities decided that it’s time they brought about a positive change in the lives of the prisoners.

*This is a story of a small group of organic farmers and their supporters in Bugon, Sariaya, living at the foothills of Mount Banahaw in the province of Quezon, Philippines, which mediated and coordinated the Biggest Human Peace Sign of 12,000 people October 2009, during the World March for Peace and Nonviolence in the Philippines.*

*I am looking at the families that have been affected by the violence. Especially those families like ours whose members have been killed or detained or tortured. I want to focus on what happens with these families, especially of the children, for the restoration of peace in the family, the restoration of peace in the communities.
*