Michael de Laine

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 6 September 2010

“We Wept Without Tears”, a best-selling book containing interviews with the few surviving Jewish members of the Sonderkommando at the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau, is now available in a Danish version. Published by Introite! Publishers and released on 7 September, the book - “Vi græd uden tårer” - contains material not published before.

“We Wept Without Tears” comprises interviews with the few surviving Jewish members of the Sonderkommando.

The Sonderkommando consisted primarily of Jewish prisoners forced by the Nazi Germans to facilitate the mass extermination at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Though never involved in the actual killings, they were compelled to be the “members of the staff” of the Nazi death factory and deal with incoming prisoners, collect their clothes, jewelry and other belongings, remove hair and gold fillings, and remove their remains from crematoria.

Some of these men, who witnessed at first hand the unparalleled horror of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, had never spoken of their experiences before.

Over a period of years, the book’s author, Dr Gideon Greif, conducted intensive interviews with all the Sonderkommando survivors living in Israel. They described not only the specific technical details of the Nazi killing programme, but also the moral and human challenges they faced while fulfilling their appalling work.

The book provides direct testimony about the “Final Solution of the Jewish Problem”, but it is also a unique document on the boundless cruelty and the deceit practised by the Nazi German regime on the victims.

“We Wept Without Tears” documents the helplessness and powerlessness of the 1.5 million people, 90% of them Jews, who were brutally murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

The book also contains a 100-page historical and updated overview of the Sonderkommando and its role in the Nazi regime.

Already published in Israel, Germany, USA, UK and Poland, “We Wept Without Tears” was launched in a Danish version on 7 September with the title “Vi græd uden tårer”.

The 500-page hardback book contains five new and never before published drawings and plans of the crematoria by the architect Peter Siebers; 20 photos from the Auschwitz Album; some of the clandestine photos; and a foreword by the well-known Danish researcher Dr Therkel Stræde.

Dr Gideon Greif was born in Tel Aviv, Israel, in 1951.

He is an Israeli historian who has primarily dedicated his research to the history of the Nazi German extermination camps.

For many years he worked for Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, Israel, the principle institution in the world studying the history of the Holocaust. He was also an international research scholar at the Sue and Leonard Miller Center for Contemporary Judaic Studies at the University of Miami.

The author is now chief historian and researchers at the Shem Olam Institute in Israel, and senior historian and researcher at the Foundation for Holocaust Education Projects in Florida, USA.

Gideon Greif is the author of a lot of scientific articles and documentaries about Shoah (the Holocaust) for radio and television. Today he travels all around the world doing lectures for students and researchers.

“Vi græd uden tårer” was translated by Tom Havemann
. 500 pages. Hardback. Publisher: Introit. ISBN: 978-87-90820-42-8. Recommended retail price: 399.95 Dkr.

Click here and here to see a two-part interview by the Copenhagen Voice with Gideon Greif.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 27 January 2010

Symbiosis was the key to how a Jewish family with many dwarfs survived the Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz and the notorious Dr Josef Mengele. Jews, dwarfs, gypsies and homosexuals were among those annihilated in the Holocaust, but the Ovitz family stuck together, humoured Mengele and were subjected to his experiments – the doctor dependent on the family as objects of scientific interest, the family dependent on his interest in them for their survival.

Today is the 65th anniversary of the liberation by Soviet troops of the Nazis’ concentration camp at Auschwitz. Among the survivors of the Holocaust was the Ovitz family, Romanian-born Jewish circus actors/traveling musicians who performed under the name the Lilliput Troupe.

They sang and played music using small instruments and performed all over Romania, Hungary and Czechoslovakia in the 1930s and 1940s. The Ovitzes sang in Yiddish, Hungarian, Romanian, Russian and German. Most of them were dwarfs, and the taller relatives helped backstage.

At the start of World War II, the Ovitz family had 12 members, seven of them dwarfs. When Hungary seized Northern Transylvania in September 1940, new racial laws banned Jewish artists from entertaining non-Jews, but the Ovitzes were able to continue touring until 15 May 1944, when all twelve family members were deported to Auschwitz.

Here they attracted Mengele’s attention. The doctor – known as the Angel of Death – separated the Ovitzes from the rest of the camp inmates to add them to his collection of test subjects. He was curious about the fact that the family included both dwarfs and taller members, partly because dwarfs were harder to find than other kinds of test subjects, such as twins. To keep the family healthy, Mengele ensured they had better and more hygienic living conditions, better food and their own bedclothes; they were also allowed them to keep their own clothes, so they did not need to wear stripes or the yellow ‘Jude’ badges.

Like many other camp inmates, the Ovitzes were subjected to various tests. Mengele ordered them to strip naked so he could present them to a group of visiting dignitaries; he also made a film of them for Adolf Hitler’s amusement. Fearing for their lives, the Ovitzes humored Mengele and sang German songs – some written by Mengele – for him when ordered to do so.

The Red Army took the family to the Soviet Union, where they lived in a refugee camp for some time before they were released and travelled back to their home village. They found their home looted and travelled to Belgium. In May 1949, they emigrated to Israel, settled in Haifa, and began their tours again, being quite successful and packing large concert halls. In 1955, they retired and bought a cinema hall.

This is the story depicted by Eilat Negev and Yehuda Koren, authors of ‘I hjertet var vi kæmper’. This is the Danish version of ‘In Our Hearts We Were Giants’, their book about the Ovitz family – the Lilliput Troupe – which survived the Holocaust.

Askholms Forlag published the Danish-language book (ISBN: 978-8791679-17-9) today – International Holocaust Memorial Day.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 19 February 2010

A new organisation, EMKR, will work for direct influence for ethnic minority women in Denmark, and it aims at being a platform promoting the political agenda of these women in Danish society. As well as “creating a new and realistic picture of ethnic minority women”, EMKR will work with other organisations that focus on the status of women in Denmark – and will also speak for men and children in ethnic minorities.

The Ethnic Minority Women’s Council (Etniske Minoritets Kvinders Råd, EMKR), set up last September, wants to speak the case of not only women from ethnic minorities living in Denmark, but also of their men and children.

EMKR will collaborate with and support other organisations related to the status of women in Denmark, but its focus will be on women from the ethnic minorities because, in the words of Trésor Kankindi, EMKR’s chair, these women “are one of the most discussed groups in Denmark – but never by themselves.”

According to Trésor Kankindi, who came from Burundi and has lived in Denmark for nine years, “EMKR wants to change that. We want to show ethnic Danes that immigrant women are just as diverse as everyone else. And we want to qualify the many perceptions that exist.”

In a press release issued in connection with a meeting presenting the board of the new organisation, EMKR’s treasurer, Annam Al-Hayali, said, “Women with a minority background are over-represented in many social areas in Denmark, including health and poverty. It’s important that we get problems like these on the political agenda without the focus being on our religion or culture.” Annam Al-Hayali, who came to Denmark from Iraq in 1996, is the co-ordinator of EMKR’s social committee.

Getting the problems discussed on a correct basis means there is a need for information, and EMKR has set up an information committee with Hakima Lasham Lakhrissi at the helm.

“Many people talk about us on the background of public feeling,” she said. “But we must have a proper factual basis if we are to make a difference and bring the problems into the light. The burka debate is just the most recent example of a distorted debate.”

Hakima Lasham Lakhrissi, who emigrated from Morocco to Denmark in 1991, added, “We have a lot to offer, and we’d like that to have a clearer role in the debate.”

EMKR also has a communications committee that will be pro-active towards the media.

“Instead of waiting for the media to present a truer and varied picture of women from ethnic minorities, we aim at writing the agenda ourselves,” said Alma Bekturganova Andersen, who trained as a journalist in Kazakhstan and now lives in Denmark.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 23 February 2010

Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen today named a series of new ministers in his Liberal-Conservative government after Søren Gade yesterday confirmed that he will be leaving not just his post of Minister of Defence, but also Danish politics.

Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen (Liberals) today named a series of new ministers in his Liberal-Conservative government.

The announcement – which has ended a long period of speculation about his government’s line-up in the period to the next parliamentary election, due in November 2011 at the latest – came after Søren Gade (Liberals) yesterday confirmed that he will be leaving not just his post of Minister of Defence, but also Danish politics.

According to observers, Gade has been sideswiped by a number of events in recent months that have put a heavy strain on his credibility as minister. These include leaks about military actions in Iraq that are said to have endangered the lives of Danish soldiers, as well as the way the Danish military have reacted to the publication of a book about the country’s special forces.

“Of course I respect Søren’s decision, but I also greatly regret it,” Lars Løkke Rasmussen said after Gade had told the Prime Minister during the weekend that he would step down. “Søren is a highly respected Defence Minister with great empathy, great involvement and great political ability, which have enabled him to carry out a very difficult task.”

One of Gade’s jobs as Minister of Defence has been to attend the funerals of Danish troops killed in action in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Lene Espersen (Conservative) moves from the Ministry for Economic and Business Affairs to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, replacing Per Stig Møller (Conservative), who moves to the Ministry for Culture.

Culture Minister Carina Christensen (Conservatives) and Minister for Development Cooperation Ulla Tørnæs (Liberals) leave the government.

Brian Mikkelsen (Conservatives) moves from the Ministry for Justice to the Ministry for Economic and Business Affairs.

Karen Ellemann (Liberals) moves from the Ministry for the Interior and Social Affairs to the Ministry for the Environment, replacing Troels Lund Poulsen (Liberals), who moves to the Ministry for Taxation. Kristian Jensen leaves the Ministry for Taxation to become parliamentary group chairman for the Liberals.

Ellemann takes over the post as Minister for Nordic Cooperation from Bertel Haarder (Liberals).

Gitte Lillelund Bech (Liberals) replaces Søren Gade as Minister of Defence. Hans Christian Schmidt moves from the post of parliamentary group chairman for the Liberals to the Ministry for Transport, replacing Lars Barfoed (Conservatives), while Søren Pind (Liberals) takes over as Minister for Development Cooperation. Lars Barfoed becomes Minister for Justice.

The Ministry for the Interior will be combined with the Ministry for Health and Prevention under Bertel Haarder, who leaves the Ministry for Education. Haarder replaces Minister for Health and Prevention, Jakob Axel Nielsen, who leaves the government.

New Minister for Social Affairs is Benedikte Kiær (Conservatives), first deputy chair of the Capital region of Denmark. Tine Nedergaard, the Liberals’ financial affairs spokesperson, is named Minister for Education.

Helge Sander (Liberals) stops as Minister for Science, Technology and Innovation. Sander is replaced by Charlotte Sahl-Madsen (Conservatives), chair of the board of the Danfoss Universe hands-on science park.

Minister for Food, Agriculture and Fisheries Eva Kjer Hansen (Liberals) is replaced by Henrik Høegh, the Liberals’ spokesperson on food and agriculture.

Inger Støjberg (Liberals) continues as Minister for Employment, while the Ministry for Gender Equality is transferred to Lykke Friis (Liberals), who continues as Minister for Climate and Energy.

Claus Hjort Frederiksen (Liberals) continues as Minister for Finance. Birthe Rønn Hornbech (Liberals) continues as Minister for Refugee, Immigration and Integration Affairs and as Minister for Ecclesiastical Affairs.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 24 February 2010

High prosperity and growth will enable Denmark to form a society with secure welfare, decent care of the elderly, a world-class health service and a clean environment, the government says in a new policy document.

Following the government reshuffle yesterday, when Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen (Liberals) named a number of new ministers, the Liberal-Conservative government today released a new policy document, ‘Danmark 2020 – Viden > vækst > velstand > velfærd (Denmark 2020 – Knowledge > growth > prosperity > welfare)’.

The document contains the Liberal-Conservative ten ambitious targets for Denmark that will “gather the nation and mobilise the strengths that we all have”. These targets also focus on Denmark’s long-term challenges, the government said.

The overall target is to ensure that Denmark is among the ten wealthiest countries in the world in 2020.

“High prosperity and growth are the foundation for giving us the freedom to form our society as we want it: with secure welfare, decent care of the elderly, a world-class health service and a clean environment,” the government said in the policy document. It added that although the work to meet the targets starts immediately, the targets are so ambitious that it will take time to reach them.

Getting out of the international crisis that has hit Denmark means “We need a society with strong values, a society where we collaborate and have confidence in and respect for each other,” the government said. “We need a global view and national roots. We need economic responsibility in both the public economy and businesses. We need more dynamism in terms of work, education, savings, investments and entrepreneurialism.”

The government’s ten targets are based on 69 sub-targets or activities in the coming years.

The government wants Denmark to be among the ten richest countries in 2020, measured in terms of gross national product per capita. Denmark’s economic policy shall be tenable in the long term, its businesses must be among the most innovative in the world and the country must be among the best creators of growth businesses. This will be achieved through control of public spending, restoration of the public finances, encouragement of investments and innovation, and a reduced administrative burden.

The percentage on Danes on the labour market, and the hours they work, must be among the 10 highest in the world. This will be achieved through special focus on youth and long-term unemployment, a reform of early retirement schemes, and attracting key staff from abroad.

Danish schoolchildren must be among the top five in the world in reading, mathematics and natural sciences by 2020.

At least one Danish university must be among the top ten universities in Europe, and all the universities must retain or improve their international rankings. This will be achieved through courses that meet the needs of society, high ambitions in research and innovation, and strengthened basic research.

Denmark shall be among the ten countries with the highest life expectancy. This is to be achieved through improvements in certain areas of the health system, dearer tobacco and alcohol, and greater focus on exercise.

Denmark must among the world’s three most energy efficient countries in the OECD, and must also see the highest growth in the share of renewable and sustainable energy. There must be a cut in the nutrients seeping to its water environment. Here the focus will be on green transport, phasing out of fossil fuels, agriculture as a supplier of green energy, lower consumption of pesticides and turning Denmark into a laboratory for green growth.

Denmark should be among the countries where differences in incomes are smallest in 2020, and where there is a fight against poverty. Homelessness, social exclusion and drug abuse will be in focus, and civil society and voluntary organisations will be included in social work.

Denmark must among the freest countries in Europe in terms of political and other rights and among the best to integrate non-western immigrants and their successors. This will be achieved through a review of the alien and integration legislation, an end to parallel societies in Denmark and a focus on anti-radicalisation.

Denmark must one of the countries with the highest degree of confidence in other people and the authorities, without corruption and where the risk of serious crime is among the lowest in Europe. Crime and terror prevention, confidence the people can change for the better and greater feeling of personal responsibility will help achieve this target.

The Danish public sector must be among the most efficient and least bureaucratic in the world by 2020.

In addition, the government wants Denmark to be securely anchored in the heart of Europe, with a referendum on the country’s opt-outs in EU policies. Denmark must focus on free trade, human rights, democracy, international aid and collaboration about the climate, and must work towards stability and peace.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 24 February 2010

Long-term projections show that fiscal pressures and debt will rise for 20-30 years after 2015, the Ministry of Finance says in its convergence programme report to the European Union. This partly reflects the retirement of large cohorts and falling revenues from gas and oil extraction in the North Sea. However, the Welfare Agreement from 2006 dampens the deficits significantly, the ministry adds. The international crisis has increased the fiscal challenges significantly compared to the Convergence Programme 2008. At the same time, public consumption spending is higher than expected.

Denmark today submitted its Convergence Programme 2009 to the European Union as part of the EU’s Stability and Growth Pact, the Ministry of Finance says.

The ministry says Denmark’s Convergence Programme report takes stock of the 2015 Plan and the outlook for public finances in light of the global crisis and the economic policy measures that have been decided since Convergence Programme 2008, when Denmark fulfilled the convergence criteria for stable exchange rate, inflation, interest rate, as well as the fiscal balance and government debt.

Moreover, the Convergence Programme illustrates the policy requirements in order to meet the targets in the 2015 Plan and expectations that the EU Council of Ministers will recommend Denmark to bring its fiscal deficit below the EU mandate of 3% of GDP by no later than 2013.

“Due to the debt reduction before the international economic crisis and the tax reform in the Spring Package 2.0, Denmark was in a good position to reach the target in the 2015 Plan of (structural) balance in public finances in 2015,” the ministry says. The international crisis has increased the fiscal challenges significantly compared to the Convergence Programme 2008. At the same time, public consumption spending is higher than expected.

In order to reach the target of (structural) balance in public finances in 2015 new initiatives are required that strengthen public finances by 1.8% of gross domestic product (GDP), the ministry adds. “This corresponds to a consolidation of around DKK 31 billion. A consolidation of this scale will also ensure fiscal sustainability.”

As a starting point, the ministry projects fiscal deficit of 5.5% of GDP for this year, which is expected to lead to a recommendation from the EU to bring back the deficit below 3% of GDP no later than 2013 and take effective action to ensure a strengthening of the structural balance by 1.5% of GDP during 2011-13.

On current assumptions, this recommendation is estimated to require consolidation measures of around DKK 24 billion. Adhering to the EU recommendation would therefore contribute about three-quarters of the required consolidation in order to reach the 2015 target.

“The assumed consolidation implies a reduction of public consumption as a share of GDP from a historical high level of just over 28% of cyclically adjusted GDP this year to around 26.75% in 2015,” the ministry says. “This is still high and higher than the benchmark in the 2015 Plan of 26.5% of cyclically adjusted GDP.”

According to the ministry, technical long-term projections indicate that prospects after 2015 are for a period of 20-30 years of rising fiscal pressures and increasing debt. This partly reflects the retirement of large cohorts and falling revenues from gas and oil extraction in the North Sea. However, the Welfare Agreement from 2006 dampens the deficits significantly.

“The international economic crisis has significantly altered the economic realities,” says Minister of Finance Claus Hjort Frederiksen. “The new Convergence Programme illustrates that the crisis has shifted the balance between revenues and expenditures significantly and we are therefore facing an substantial task in order to restore public finances.”

Reaching the 2015 Plan’s target of fiscal balance in 2015 means Denmark must consolidate public finances by a total of DKK 31 billion over the next 5 years, the minister says. If the EU says Denmark must reduce the fiscal deficit to below 3% of GDP, probably no later than in 2013, the government will adhere to this recommendation.

“The government will therefore initiate a multi-annual effort, taking effect already in 2011, in order to re-establish the balance in public finances and to halt the debt accumulation,” Claus Hjort Frederiksen says. “This means, among other things, that we aim to keep public consumption stable for regional, local and central government overall. At the same time, all public expenditures will be examined closely in order to solve the task as gently as possible.”

The minister adds that the government is carrying out a very expansionary fiscal policy in 2010 and will avoid making decisions that may jeopardize the incipient recovery. “At the same time,” he says, “we will prepare consolidation from 2011, provided the economy develops as expected.”

The minister says the government’s specific proposals will be presented among other things in the fiscal bills for the coming years.

“It will not be an easy task, but the longer we postpone the task, the larger the challenge becomes,” Claus Hjort Frederiksen says. “If we do not solve the task relatively quickly, debt and interest expenditures will grow fast, and interest expenditures will, like a cuckoo in the nest, weaken the possibilities to finance important welfare functions.”

He says economic growth will keep Denmark among the wealthiest countries in the world also by 2020. The government will improve education, focus on innovation and green technologies and create more labour supply, including through faster completion of studies and fewer people on early retirement (disability) pension.

These measures are outlined in the government’s policy document, also released today.

Under its Convergence Programme, each country reports on its targets and economic policy measures regarding the development of public finances in the short and medium term within the framework of the common EU rules as well as targets and measures regarding long term fiscal sustainability. EU countries not participating in the Euro report also on their monetary and exchange rate policies.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 3 March 2010

The first head-to-head debate between the top politicians vying for the post of Danish Prime Minister at the next parliamentary election indicates that the main theme of the campaign will be the economy, and which parties will be better at ensuring Denmark recovers from the present financial crisis. The main themes of the election campaigns for the past decade – immigration and integration – were absent in yesterday’s clash of Prime Minister candidates.

The first head-to-head debate between the present Prime Minister, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, who leads the Liberal-Conservative coalition government, and Helle Thorning-Schmidt, who leads the Social Democrats, indicates that the economy, and which parties will be better at ensuring Denmark recovers from the present financial crisis, will be the main themes of the campaigning at the next parliamentary election, to be held in November 2011 at the latest.

Immigration and integration – the main themes of the election campaigns for the past decade – were absent in yesterday’s clash of the top politicians vying for the post of Danish Prime Minister.

Should the government cut public budgets or focus on public works to improve the infrastructure to help Denmark weather the present financial crisis, with its rising unemployment? And what path should the government choose in its endeavours to improve the public finances by a total of DKK 31 billion by 2015, as long-standing Danish plans and the EU require?

What should be done about the hospitals and should the tax cuts in the coming years be postponed?

These were among the subjects discussed by the two Prime Minister candidates.

Apart from the problem for the national economy posed by the scheme for early retirement, there was little agreement between Lars Løkke Rasmussen, whose Liberal-Conservative coalition government relies on the support of the Danish People’s Party, and Helle Thorning-Schmidt, whose Social Democrats are in a sort of parliamentary partnership with the Socialist People’s Party and who may need the support of the Social Liberals to form a government.

But in the matter of national economics (and, in fact, in certain areas of immigration and integration), the Social Liberals take a different line, which could make it difficult for Helle Thorning-Schmidt to form a government.

Both she and Lars Løkke Rasmussen were reticent to reveal their economic plans – the Social Democrats/Socialist People’s Party plan is not yet finished, but will focus on employment, while the government’s budget for 2011, due in August, depends in part on the review of the Danish economy to be published by the ministry of Finance in May.

The head-to-head was arranged by the Politiken newspaper.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 7 March 2010

At the approach of International Women’s Day (IWD) tomorrow, 8 March, Danish women’s groups are planning a demonstration against proposals by the Danish People’s Party to increase gender inequality and return women to the kitchens.

Proposals by the Danish People’s Party (DF) to increase inequality between women and men, “return women to the kitchens”, downplay support of elderly citizens and ban employees in the public sector from wearing scarves have triggered plans for a demonstration by women’s groups next weekend.

“Prohibiting women from wearing scarves in their public sector jobs is not only deeply unsympathetic and discriminating it is also extremely stupid,” says Hakima Lasham Lakhrissi one of the people behind the planned demonstration.

Hakima chairs the Association of Danish International Women (FDIK) and is a member of the board of the Ethnic Minority Women’s Council (EMKR).

“There are so many different reasons why women wear scarves,” says Hakima, who does not wear the type of headscarf associated with women from ethnic minorities. “For some wearing headscarves is a religious act, for others it is simply a tradition – just as it was for ethnic Danish women a generation or two ago. But why should wearing a scarf disqualify these women from contributing to the Danish society that they see themselves being a part of?”

Noting that 8 March is International Women’s Day (IWD), Hakima says, “A lot of work has gone into getting these women on to the labour market – and this is starting to become successful. There is a real need for these women, who to a large extent care for the elderly. And now DF is trying to destroy all this good work. DF is damaging the efforts towards women’s equality and the proposals are detrimental to the many elderly who need their care. And what DF wants is not least deleterious to integration.”

The demonstration will starts at Rådhuspladsen, Copenhagen city hall, on Saturday, 13 March, at 2.00 p.m. and will last an hour.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 18 March 2010

A political agreement between the government and the Danish People’s Party has ambushed the Irak Center set up by the daily newspaper Politiken. The agreement will prevent rejected Iraqi asylum-seekers applying for work and residence permits after getting employment in highly paid specialist jobs.

A political agreement between the Liberal-Conservative coalition government and its parliamentary supporters in the Danish People’s Party has ambushed the Irak Center, set up in November by the daily newspaper Politiken.

The new agreement, announced on Monday, will prevent rejected Iraqi asylum-seekers getting employment in jobs that pay 32,000 Danish kroner a month. This level of income means the Iraqis can apply for work and residence permits in Denmark under a special scheme that also requires the jobs to be done by people with special expertise.

Politiken said last year that the Irak Center will employ as many as possible of the 100 or so failed Iraqi asylum-seekers remaining in Denmark after recent forced repatriations of other Iraqis whose asylum applications have been rejected. The Iraqis will provide information about their home country and about the conditions for Iraqi asylum-seekers.

“We’ve decided to help a group of rejected asylum-seekers who have been caught up in the system,” said Tøger Seidenfaden, Politiken’s editor-in-chief, in November. “They’ve been living in a grey zone for years. The UN is still issuing warnings against sending them back to Iraq, and they have been unable to get residence permits in Denmark.”

The government and the Danish People’s Party said at the time that they would change the law to end “an abuse of the scheme to attract highly educated people and specialists” to Denmark. Those changes came earlier this week.

Four rejected Iraqi asylum-seekers applied for work and residence permits before Christmas after they had been accepted by the Irak Center as potential employees. Although the Danish Immigration Service promised at the time that the applications would be processed in a month, no decision had been taken this week. Stig Ørskov, another top editor at Politiken and also the chairman of Irak Center’s board, told the newspaper that he has few expectations the Iraqis will be given the necessary permits.

“The political signals have clearly been against our project and now they will legislate directly against such a possibility,” Ørskov said. “Although there has been no decision on the applications, we are greatly concerned that they will be rejected.”

In their agreement, the Liberals, the Conservatives and the Danish People’s Party referred to “a number of recent cases”, and then added “foreigners who try to abuse the rules will be rejected”.

“This agreement shows that the construction of the Irak Center was not illegal, as some politicians claimed,” Ørskov added. “Otherwise there would not have been a need to take these steps.”

“We will not accept that organizations or newspapers such as Politiken try to circumvent the intentions of the existing legislation,” Peter Skaarup, deputy leader of the Danish People’s Party, said in comments on the new agreement. “Therefore we are tightening the rules, so asylum-seekers who have been rejected cannot simply go to another office to get their stay here extended.”

Skaarup, who is also his party’s integration affairs spokesman, said in November he doubted that the Danish Immigration Service would give the go-ahead to jobs in the Irak Center, so allowing the rejected Iraqi asylum-seekers to get residence and work permits.

“The Iraqis probably do not have the qualifications to earn 32,000 kroner a month, so this will probably be an evasion of the law,” Skaarup said.

Ørskov added he now has difficulties in seeing the Irak Center starting its operations.

The new agreement tightens immigration regulations on 20 points, but offers a relaxation on one point: a foreigner can apply for a permanent residence permit after only four years, compared with seven years before the new proposals.

But such applications will be judged on new or stricter requirements, including a points system under which applicants must have 100 points deriving from voluntary work, Danish language skills, employment of at least two-and-a-half years and no criminal convictions.

Refugees who go on holiday to their home country without the permission of the Danish authorities will have their residence permit suspended for ten years.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 18 March 2010

A Danish-led international research project will link computer technology, biotechnology and nanoscience in an artificial living cell that imitates the internal functions a biological cell. Self-repair, self-assembly and self-replication are cell functions that will be imitated in a project with the potential to change our lives.

The world may soon see a new revolution - useable ‘living’ devices in the energy, medical and computer fields - if research into ‘living technology’, a ground-breaking field at the crossroads between computer technology, biotechnology and nanoscience, is successful.

While the industrial revolution mechanised production with factories and the information revolution mechanised information processing with computers, “We’re paving the way for a new revolution,” says professor Steen Rasmussen of the University of Southern Denmark. “We’re combining production and information processing in an artificial sub-cellular matrix, which imitates living cells found in plants, animals and humans.”

The researchers have started creating an artificial sub-cellular matrix, called Matrix for Chemical IT or MATCHIT. This imitates internal functions of a biological cell - information processing, self-programming, self-repair, self-assembly and self-replication. MACHIT can make its own decisions – just like a biological cell operates as a combined information processing and production machine, identifying and creating what is needed.

The scientists, however, programme MACHIT’s main tasks by combining the technology of MEMS (micro-electronic-mechanical systems – sometimes called micro-machines) with soft nano- and micro-scaled functional materials as well as a chemistry that could be similar to the biochemistry found in the earliest organisms on earth.

“The artificial sub-cellular matrix is made up of chemical containers on a silicon chip,” says Rasmussen. Through DNA tagging and DNA computing, the containers interact inside minute channels on the chip. “We use micro-cameras to feed information about the containers into a computer, which calculates how electrodes or channels are opened or turned off. As a result, the containers can be guided around the chip and provide what the system needs to complete its programmed tasks.”

Rasmussen adds, “The technology we’re developing is different from anything we know today. It will be based on the same principles as life. If your mobile phone breaks, somebody needs to fix it. But if you cut your hand, it heals itself. Living technology has potential applications in all sectors of our society and therefore has the potential to change how we live. The possibilities are endless – both beautiful and scary.”

Rasmussen is the project coordinator for a consortium of researchers kick-started the project at the European Center for Living Technology in Venice earlier this month.

The international consortium comprises: the Center for Fundamental Living Technology (FLinT) and the Mærsk McKinney Møller Institute at the University of Southern Denmark; the Biomolecular Information Processing (BioMIP) group and the Organic Chemistry I group at Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany; the Crown Human Genome Center and the Department of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel; and the European Center for Living Technology, Italy.

The research project has received €2.8 million euros funding over three years from the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme for research and technological development for the period 2007 to 2013.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 25 March 2010

Empowering women in developing countries is “smart economics” that gives them jobs, helps them contribute to economic growth, and promotes greater liberty and democracy. But there are challenges that must be overcome before success is achieved.

Empowering women in developing countries in a way that gives them employment is “smart economics”. Not only does this give them jobs and help them contribute to economic growth, it is a route to combat poverty and a movement towards greater liberty and democracy. But there are challenges that must be overcome before success is achieved.

Such was the message delivered at today’s conference on women’s empowerment and employment, arranged by the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Part of the ministry’s Millennium Development Goals (MDG) series, the meeting was a precursor for the MDG high-level meeting in New York in September, which will assess the extent to which the millennium goals are being implemented.

Across the developing world, far more women continue to be out of the labour market than men, according to the Millennium Development Goals report from 2009. Northern Africa and western Asia have exceptionally low female employment-to-population ratios, and only about 20% of working-age women are employed in the most important sectors here, industry and services.

Overall, almost two-thirds of all employed women have vulnerable jobs, either as contributing family workers or as own-account workers, yet MDG 1 has a target that aims at full and productive employment and decent work for all, including women and young people, while MDG 3 aims at promoting gender equality and empowering women.

But there are many barriers to success in reaching these goals, and the world economic crisis has delayed progress – and even reversed developments by five or six years.

“We must empower women for them to gain their rights and promote economic growth,” Søren Pind, Denmark’s recently appointed Minister for Development Cooperation, told the conference.

Pind added that a new draft for Denmark’s development cooperation has five focus areas, including gender equality and boosting the position and status of women.

“Through economic growth we can try to help and empower women, and that helps combat poverty,” Pind said.

“Empowering women is smart economics,” said Robert E Zoellick, the president of the World Bank group.

Various reports indicate that improving women’s situation can benefit society in ways that transcend the direct benefits to individual women. Women’s independent earnings improve the well-being of their families and communities, reduce poverty and stimulate economic growth. Higher income for women and better access to and control over their resources lead to better health and nutrition for children. In Bangladesh, access to micro-finance increases household consumption when the borrower is a woman, and access to credit also improves children’s health and nutrition.

While noting that women “can be driving forces in economic growth”, Zoellick added, “Women and girls are hit first by economic downturns.”

The world economic crisis means that micro-finance institutions – many of which lend money on very favourable terms to entrepreneurial women in developing countries – are now seeing that their customers are having difficulties repaying their loans, and the institutions may also face problems raising the new capital needed for their work, Zoellick added.

Helen Clark, the administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), warned that there are very serious challenges to achieving the Millennium Development Goals. These challenges include classic areas of dispute such as rich versus poor, urban versus rural and men versus women.

But, Clark underlined, “Investing in women and girls has a multiplier effect across the Millennium Development Goals and expands the economic possibilities and employment of women. Women’s legal skills and situation must be strengthened in terms of their rights and to enable them to take part in decision-making processes, including in national legislatures.” This would ensure greater equality.

Carsten Staur, Denmark’s ambassador to the United Nations, summed up the recommendations from the conference discussions in five themes:

• Economic empowerment of women as a rights’ issue and as smart economics.
• Expansion of women’s entrepreneurship opportunities.
• Creation of opportunities to overcome social and cultural barriers.
• Priority for women’s health, including sexual and reproductive health and rights.
• Voice and political participation.

Staur will be presenting the recommendations at the MDG high-level meeting in September.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 27 May 2010

Some people call them terrorists, others call them freedom-fighters. The Palestinians name schools, streets and sporting events after people they consider to be role models in an effort to undermine the chances of peace with Israel, claims Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), an Israeli non-government organisation (NGO) that studies Palestinian society from a broad range of perspectives by monitoring and analysing the Palestinian Authority through its media and schoolbooks.

PMW’s major focus is on the messages that the Palestinian leaders, from the Palestinian Authority (PA), Fatah and Hamas, send to the population through the broad range of institutions and infrastructures they control.

In a new report, “From Terrorists to Role Models: The Palestinian Authority’s

Institutionalization of Incitement”, PMW documents how the Palestinian Authority has named numerous locations and events after Palestinian terrorists responsible for killing Israeli civilians. Palestinian Media Watch says the report “documents the ongoing Palestinian Authority policy of glorifying terrorists through the naming of places and events after them, especially after those responsible for the most murderous attacks.

PMW investigates the breadth of this phenomenon and to what extent it continues in 2010.

The organisation also assesses whether this represents activities of a fringe group within society, or represents Palestinian Authority policy.

PMW notes that the Palestinian Authority’s naming of a square in Ramallah in March 2010 after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi was not an isolated incident. It is one example among many of how the PA has institutionalized incitement by systematically turning terrorists into role models.

Dalal Mughrabi, whose 1978 bus hijacking killed 37 civilians, more Israelis than any other Palestinian terror attack, has been immortalized through the naming of numerous places and events, including: two elementary schools, a kindergarten, a computer centre, summer camps, football tournaments, a community centre, a sports team, a public square, a street, an election course, an adult education course, a university club, a dance troupe, a military unit, a dormitory in a youth centre, a TV quiz team and a graduation ceremony. And Mughrabi is just one example among many.

PMW has included 100 examples of places and events named after 46 different terrorists in its report in order to show the scope of the phenomenon. 26 of the examples have been reported in the Palestinian media in 2010.

“Terror glorification is highly visible in Palestinian society,” PMW states. “A Palestinian child can walk to school along a street named after the terrorist Abu Jihad, who planned a bus hijacking that killed 37, spend the day learning in a school named after Hamas founder Ahmad Yassin, in the afternoon play football in a tournament named after suicide terrorist Abd Al-Basset Odeh who killed 31, and end his day at a youth centre named after terrorist Abu Iyad, responsible for killing the 11 Olympic athletes in Munich.

“A young woman can join a university women’s club named Sisters of Dalal, after Dalal Mughrabi, attend a week at Al-Quds University honouring suicide bomb builder Yahya Ayyash, and participate in university rallies named after numerous terrorists.

“Honouring terrorists envelops and plays a significant part in defining the Palestinian world.”

The NGO claims that explicit and unmitigated rejection of terror on moral grounds is a basic condition for a sincere and lasting peace. Whereas the PA leadership has publicly committed to fight violence, this message can only be seen as insincere by their own people, when numerous terrorists who murdered Israelis are repeatedly glorified by the PA leadership even in 2010.

Indeed, there is no more fundamental statement of support for violence and terror than when the single act of intentionally targeting and killing Israeli civilians is enough to immortalize the name of the killer, PMW says.

If there is to be any chance for peace, the Palestinian leadership must convince their own people that terror is rejected — not merely because it is damaging to Palestinian interests in 2010, but because it is immoral and wrong at all times.

For peace to have a chance, terrorists must be ostracised as immoral outcasts, not immortalized as heroes and role models, Palestinian Media Watch says.

by Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 3 June 2010

The Danish Economic Council sees the current expansive financial policy as supporting Denmark’s economy in 2010, but the prospect is for slow growth in the future. But financial policy must be tightened in 2011 to maintain credibility of the economic policy. Low GDP growth in the future implies tighter control over public spending, while the prospect of permanent improvement in the public debt of DKK 12-13 billion every year from 2011 implies a new plan for the period to 2020.

In its latest report on the Danish economy, the Danish Economic Council (the economic “wise men”) sees the current expansive financial policy as supporting Denmark’s economy in 2010, but the prospect is for slow growth in the future.

“Almost all European countries need to reduce their public deficits to maintain or regain finance policy credibility,” the wise men say. Tightening of both foreign and domestic finance policy will contribute to reducing growth in the coming years. It is expected that monetary policy will be normalised, resulting in higher interest rates.

“Together with a continued need for consolidation in the banking sector and in households, this will also tend towards lower growth,” the wise men add.

Turbulence on the financial markets as a result of too large public deficits in certain countries is a factor that can contribute to hampering a growing boom.

Financial policy was very expansive in 2009 and 2010, and the level this year equals the recommendations of the Danish Economic Council in its 2009 reports, which, however, recommended that a larger part of the expansion should come from public investments rather than public expenditure.

“Our recommendations for broad reforms – including of the early retirement scheme – have not been followed sufficiently,” the wise men say. “At the same time there are signs of some economic growth and rather lower unemployment than expected previously, so a tightening of financial policy in 2011 is now the prime recommendation.”

Control of public spending has been poor in the past decade, the wise men say, and on average the real growth in public consumption was twice as high as expected.

The Danish Economic Council expects considerably lower growth in gross domestic product (GDP) in the period to 2020 than the government used in calculating its convergence programme 2009.

“Reducing the share of GDP of public consumption will therefore be very difficult,” the wise men say. “Reaching the convergence programme target of public consumption of 27% of GDP in 2020 requires zero growth in the real public consumption in the whole period from 2011 to 2020.”

Hans Jørgen Whitta-Jacobsen, who chairs the Danish Economic Council, says the prospect of low GDP growth in the future implies tighter control over public spending. “Even if we use the same assumptions about the development of the real public consumption as the government, we expect considerably higher public deficits,” he says. “We therefore see that the need for cuts is greater than the government sees.”

If the government’s recent restoration plan for the economy is carried out in full, the wise men see Denmark having a finance policy sustainability problem that will entail a need for a permanent improvement in the public debt of DKK 12-13 billion every year from 2011. Even if the deficit is improved by this amount, the deficit will never turn into a surplus, but will exceed the 3% limit stipulated by the EU’s Stability and Growth Pact in the period 2030-2060, the wise men say.

Against the background of its assessments, the Danish Economic Council recommends that a new plan should be prepared for the period to 2020, with the following elements to improve the public deficit:

• A reform of the early retirement system that reduces the maximum period with post-employment wage to three years starting in 2012.

• A labour market reform reducing the length of entitlement to unemployment benefit so much that the structural level of unemployment is reduced by 0.5 percentage point.

• An abolition of the nominal principle of the tax freeze from 2012.

• A tight fiscal policy with a milestone for reducing the public consumption’s share to a maximum of 27% of GDP in 2020.

The wise men warn that, even when all four elements of the plan have been introduced, their calculations nevertheless show that there will be a considerable deficit n the budget for the next 50 years. In the short term the budget is expected to approach balance, but even when the budget is at its lowest structural level it is expected to reach 1-2% of GDP. This underlines the fact that there may be a need for improving the budget even more within 5-10 years, the wise men say.

Commenting on the government’s recent restoration plan for the economy, the Danish Economic Council says the plan in itself is not sufficient to ensure the credibility nor the sustainability of the financial policy. The plan will reduce the sustainability element from 1.4% of GDP to 0.7%. The public deficit will worsen gradually from 2015and will exceed 4% of GDP from the end of the 2020s – and such large deficits are not economically credible.

“There will soon be a need for further reforms that can contribute to a considerable improvement in the public deficit both towards 2020 and, in the longer term, towards 2050,” says Hans Jørgen Whitta-Jacobsen.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 5 June 2010 – Constitution Day

Danish society should be freer, more cohesive, more responsible and more tolerant, says Citizen 21, an organisation of all citizens who believe in democracy, humanity wherever it is, life in all its forms, freedom and peace. The organisation, which was officially launched today, also wants to spread these values around the world, just as the philosophy of Grundtvig has spread worldwide over the past 150 years.

“Denmark is rich in islands, but it is not an isolated island in the world,” says Aziz Fall, the founder and resident of Citizen21, which terms itself an organisation of all citizens who believe in democracy, humanity wherever it is, life in all its forms, freedom and peace.

Officially launched today, Constitution Day, the organisation will work to turn Danish society into a freer, more cohesive, more responsible and more tolerant society that can become the birthplace for 21st century citizenship.

Using the Danish constitution – first signed on 5 June 1849 by King Frederick VII to mark Denmark’s transition to constitutional monarchy, thus putting an end to the absolute monarchy which had been introduced in Denmark in 1660 – as the background for Citizen21, Aziz Fall says, “Denmark has something to give to the world, and the time is right. We have the resources, the spiritual ballast and we have something in our mind. From this foundation we can build bridges and conquer the 21st century.”

He adds that doing this means the Danes themselves must wake up and become conscious and active citizens who will work to promote Citizen21’s ideas

The organisation “will draw on the country’s history in democracy, liberty and sense of social responsibility to show how a society can prepare for the challenges of the 21st century.

As well as turn Denmark into the birthplace for 21st century citizenship, Citizen21 wants to strengthen Denmark’s good reputation around the world. It will promote a more responsible civic society, where individual and joint responsibility go hand in hand, as well as consolidate the principle of freedom of expression, democracy and respect for diversity.

Aziz Fall, a Senegalese who came to Denmark 10 years ago, says the members of Citizen21 are “united by the single will to see the country more open, where everybody who lives here feels part of a human adventure where respect, dignity and active citizenship are a reality; where everybody is aware of their opportunities and obligations toward themselves, each other and the world around us.”

Citizen21 and the speakers at the official launch drew on the philosophy of Nikolaj Frederik Severin (N F S) Grundtvig, a Danish pastor, author, poet, philosopher, historian, teacher and politician whose philosophy gave rise to a new form of nationalism in the last half of the 19th century.

Grundtvig and his followers are credited with being very influential in the formulation of modern Danish national consciousness. It was steeped in the national literature and supported by deep spirituality.

An inspiration for many educationalists around the world, Grundtvig is regarded as the ideological father of the folk high school movement through his ambition for a school for life. Grundtvig believed schools should provide life-long learning preparing students for active participation in society and popular life, so practical skills as well as national poetry and history should form an essential part of the instruction.

Through his, for that time, highly unorthodox way of teaching, Kristen Kold, one of Grundtvig’s followers, gave the folk high schools a broader democratic basis in comparison to the initial religious focus.

Grundtvig was also active in discussions about the development of the 1849 constitution.

The founders of Citizen21 say they have no unity of political views or religious obedience or cultural background. They say they “are a pure reflection of the society and our belief is that the core values of democracy and humanity that founded our community provide us with tools to overcome differences and build a 21st model of society.”

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 25 August 2009

Israel wants the Swedish government to condemn a report in Aftonbladet that Israeli soldiers have systematically plundered Palestinian war victims for organs such as kidneys, supposedly sold illegally. Sweden says the press is free and the government cannot step in. Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt faces strong criticism from Israel during a planned visit in September.

Israel wants the Swedish government to condemn a report last Monday in Aftonbladet - the largest-selling Swedish daily newspaper - that Israeli soldiers have systematically plundered Palestinian war victims for organs such as kidneys, supposedly sold illegally.

Sweden says the press is free and the government cannot step in. But the country’s Foreign Minister, Carl Bildt, will face strong criticism from Israel during a planned visit on 10 September - especially after Elisabet Borsiin Bonnier, Sweden’s ambassador to Israel, criticised the newspaper article in a statement cleared by her foreign ministry’s Middle East section.

Avigdor Liberman, Israel’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and Deputy Prime Minister, “will convey a sharp protest to his Swedish counterpart, Carl Bildt, for failing to support the condemnation issued by Sweden’s ambassador in Israel, Elisabet Borsiin Bonnier, of the defamatory article published this week in the daily newspaper Aftonbladet,” the Israeli ministry said on 20 August.

According to the ministry’s statement, Liberman said that it was a pity that, after Swedish Ambassador to Israel Borsiin Bonnier did the right thing and condemned the article, thereby making clear that the newspaper did not represent Swedish views, the Swedish Foreign Ministry chose to distance itself from her remarks instead of supporting them.

“The meaning of freedom of the press is the freedom to publish the truth, not the freedom to lie and slander,” Liberman continued. “A country that truly wants to safeguard democratic values should strongly condemn false reports that reek of anti-Semitism, such as the one published this week by the newspaper Aftonbladet.”

Liberman added, “It’s a shame that the Swedish Foreign Ministry doesn’t intervene in cases of blood libels against Jews. This is reminiscent of Sweden’s position during World War II, when it also failed to intervene. The article published this week is a natural outgrowth of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and blood libels in which Jews were accused of adding the blood of Christian children to the Passover matzahs [bread in the form of crackers].”

The Aftonbladet report, by freelance journalist Daniel Boström, accused the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) of systematically plundering organs such as kidneys from its Palestinian victims and thereafter selling the organs illegally. Apart from comments from Palestinian families, who claimed that their sons had had their organs removed, and local UN staff, the journalist offered no concrete evidence for his accusations.

In 1992, Boström witnessed how a 19-year-old Palestinian, who had been shot by the IDF, was abducted, only to re-appear a few days later with stitches closing operation scars from his chin to his stomach. The journalist has connected these episodes with the arrest earlier this year of a man accused of arranging organ trafficking lasting several years.

Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who arrives in Europe today for talks with the EU, where Sweden currently holds the Presidency under Carl Bildt, demanded that Sweden formally condemn the story, which was published last week in Sweden’s top selling Aftonbladet daily.

“We’re not asking the Swedish government for an apology, we’re asking for their condemnation,” Netanyahu told a meeting of cabinet ministers, according to an unnamed Israeli official quoted in Israel’s Haaretz newspaper.

Israel’s finance minister, Yuval Steinitz, said Bildt, “is no longer welcome” to visit the country next month.

“Anyone who is unwilling to condemn such a blood libel could be considered unwanted in Israel,” he said. “The Swedish government cannot remain indifferent, and the crisis will remain until Sweden responds in a different manner.”

Bildt said the report was a matter for Aftonbladet and its editors and publisher. “Freedom of speech is a basic value in Sweden,” his said in a statement on Friday.

Bildt’s meeting in September was briefly threatened with cancellation, but Israeli politicians are now saying the only subject under discussion will be Aftonbladet article.

Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt is trying to bring Swedish-Israeli relations back to normality.

Swedish media representatives are debating whether the article should have been published at all, as there was no documentation for its claims, whether the newspaper is anti-Semitic, and why Israel should not be criticised for its conduct.

The Israeli Foreign Minister also threatened to revoke Aftonbladet’s press credentials in Israel or, at the very least, not to aid or cooperate with the newspaper’s journalists.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 29 August 2009

Copenhagen was today the base for a trial run of an international climate flashmob to be held on 21 September.

Town Hall Square was the venue today when an organisation called Tck Tck Tck held a trial run of a climate flashmob – a fun, peaceful demonstration in which participants arrive separately at a prominent location, blending in with the crowd

Having gathered together in front of Copenhagen’s town hall, some 40 people all tried to call the Prime Minister’s Office on their mobile phones. But Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen was not in the office and the many calls resulted in ‘line busy’ signals. Those who did get through reported that the answering machine said the office was closed for the day.

Tck Tck Tck wanted to urge Rasmussen to lead the way to a fair, ambitious, and binding treaty at the UN climate summit in Copenhagen in December, COP15.

This was the forerunner of a global wake-up call to politicians on 21 September that will remind the world’s political leaders of the necessity of reaching agreement.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 31 August 2009

The government’s budget for 2010 shows a deficit of 86.3 billion kroner, compared with a surplus of 59.5 billion kroner in 2008; there will be a deficit of 33.5 billion kroner in 2009. The finance ministry sees an increasing number of more certain signs that the fall in activity is slowing.

In the words of Minister of Finance Claus Hjort Frederiksen, “The international financial crisis has turned the economic situation in Denmark upside down.”

The minister presented the government’s 2010 budget last Tuesday.

It shows a deficit of 86.3 billion kroner, compared with a surplus of 59.5 billion kroner in 2008; the financial crisis and the subsequent recession are costing Denmark 145.5 billion kroner. There will be a deficit of 33.5 billion kroner in 2009. These figures correspond to 2% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2009 and about 5% of GDP in 2010.

Because of the international financial crisis, the Danish economy has changed from a situation characterised by historically low unemployment rates and labour market pressure to decreasing demand and increasing unemployment – although unemployment is still relatively low. At the same time the large surpluses on the general government budget balance in the period 2004-2008 will turn to large deficits in 2009 and 2010.

The government has introduced a number of political initiatives to alleviate the effects of the weak cyclical conditions and support employment. These include a substantial rise in total public investments, tax cuts deriving from the tax reform agreement in the spring, and the release of savings in the special pension scheme (SP).

Total public investments are expected to increase from an annual level of 31.24 billion Kroner in 2004-2008 to 42.5 billion kroner in 2010. The real growth rate in public investment will reach about 15% per year in 2009 and 2010, so double-digit growth rates are expected for two consecutive years for the first time since the 1960s. At the same time, public investment is expected to reach approximately 2.5% of GDP in 2010, the highest level since 1981.

The central government budget proposal for 2010 allocates about 6 billion kroner from the Quality fund for public investments to investments in modern hospitals, public schools, day-care facilities and the elderly-care sector. Spending on research and education, including technological investments in university laboratories, will get approximately 2.25 billion kroner from the Globalization fund. The work to protect nature, environment and climate will receive about 0.75 billion kroner in 2010. A further 0.75 million kroner is earmarked for the Danish defence. Vulnerable groups and healthy meals to children in day-care institutions are also among the major focus areas.

“In the aftermath of the global financial crisis last autumn, production and demand in Denmark and in other countries have fallen further in the first half of 2009,” the Ministry of Finance says in its latest Economic Survey. “There are now, however, an increasing number of more certain signs that the fall in activity is slowing considerably, helped by the significant fiscal and monetary policy initiatives implemented in many parts of the world. Conditions in the financial markets have generally improved, and confidence has strengthened.”

The ministry expects employment to fall both this year and next, mainly as a result of the large fall in production since last autumn. Unemployment is expected to rise with diminishing pace and reach a level of 150,000 (full-time) persons on average in 2010. The level corresponds to around 5.25% of the labour force – roughly 2 percentage points lower than the average unemployment rate over the last three decades.

Next year the fiscal deficit is expected to exceed the EU reference value of 3% of GDP. The surplus in 2008 of 3.4% of GDP is thus expected to turn into deficits of 2.0% in 2009 and 4.9% in 2010.

“This raises considerable requirements regarding consolidation of public finances in order to reach the central objective in the 2015-plan of at least balance in public finances in 2015,” the ministry says.

When presenting the budget, Claus Hjort Frederiksen said the government’s key priority “is to support demand and employment in the short run, and to make sure, that public deficits are temporary and in line with medium term fiscal targets as set out in the 2015-plan.”

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 1 September 2009

Swedish Minister of Foreign Affairs Carl Bildt says the peaceful relations between Israel and Egypt show that peace in the Middle East is possible. Last week, Bildt met his Egyptian colleague, Ahmed Aboul-Gheit, who sees Israeli settlements as the greatest barrier to peace.

Swedish Minister of Foreign Affairs Carl Bildt says that the peace that has existed between Israel and Egypt since the two countries signed the Egypt–Israel Peace Treaty in Washington DC following the 1979 Camp David Accords shows that peace in the Middle East is possible, but reaching peace requires compromises.

On 28 August, Bildt met with his Egyptian colleague, Ahmed Aboul-Gheit, who sees Israeli settlements as the greatest barrier to peace.

According to a report from the Swedish Presidency of the European Union, the two foreign ministers discussed the peace process on the Middle East - a matter of importance to both Egypt and, because the EU is part of the ‘quartet’ working towards peace in the region - to the Swedish Presidency of the European Union.

A pause in both the construction of new Israeli settlements and the expansion of existing settlements in the Palestinian areas, including East Jerusalem, is a condition for peace talks, said Ahmed Aboul-Gheit.

“Israel must be ready to temporarily stop building new settlements,” he said. “A six-month moratorium would give scope and calm for six months of negotiations.”

Whether the Israeli government would accede to the Egyptian call is unclear, but Carl Bildt felt that negotiations rest on a feeling of commitment shared by all involved parties.

“Remember that many of the conflicts in the Middle East were previously between Israel and Egypt,” Bildt said. “Now they are at peace. This shows that peace is possible, but it does require compromises.”

Aboul-Gheit placed the burden of convincing the Israeli government to stop settlements on the US administration. Ending the settlements would pave the way for making a two-state solution a success.

“We must move from the situation with an ‘occupier’ and an ‘occupant’,” the Egyptian Foreign Minister said.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 24 September 2009

The Mogens Dahl Concert Hall in Copenhagen was the venue of a rare treat yesterday, when Missing Voices - a gathering of three women performers with Middle Eastern backgrounds - met the Middle East Peace Orchestra.

Based on the Muslim Eid and the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, the performance, with its variety of sounds from horns to pipes to drums to voices, was a musical feast in name of peace.

Arranged by the US Embassy, the evening was billed as “a first of its kind concert bringing together established artists in their own right and blending their sound and heritage into one large celebration of cultures”.

The Iranian musician and dancer Shoreh Shahrzad performed an intriguing and passionate dance in a costume of her own design, and followed this with by playing a def (large Iranian drum resembling a tambourine) to accompanying music.

Another drum, an Arab darbuka, was played by Simona Abdallah, a Palestinian percussionist, also to accompanying music. One of the few women to play what has been considered a man’s instrument, Simona captured the audience with her skill, verve and thrumming.

Three traditional Afghan songs were performed by Zohreh Jooya, an Iranian-Afghan singer who journeyed from Vienna for this concert. One song, including one about the fate of a beautiful woman, was a rendition marked by passionate and emotional facial expressions and gestures.

The Middle East Peace Orchestra comprises Jewish and Arab musicians - Henrik Goldschmidt (oboe), Anders Vesterdahl (accordion), Naser Abel al Harbi (vocals), Tobias Allvin (bouzouki) and Bilal Irshed (oud) - who play the music of each other’s cultural background, both traditional and recently composed.

The orchestra’s music combines elements of Jewish ‘Klezmer’, Middle Eastern ‘Makam’ and classical Arab music. The fascinating rhythmic mix was well-received by the audience and served as an apt group rendering to match and contrast the first half’s solos.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 29 September 2009

Immigration and integration again overshadow the economy as the main subject of political debate in the run-up to the Danish parliamentary election in 2011.

Pia Kjærsgaard, the leader of the Danish People’s Party, sees the number of immigrants as the biggest problem in the Danish debate about foreigners, while the leader of the Social Liberals, Margrethe Vestager, says the problem is the weak integration efforts by Danish society.

That became clear at a debate yesterday about immigration, integration, repatriation of rejected asylum-seekers and related subjects, where Peter Mogensen, political commentator with the Politiken newspaper, was moderator.

Despite several years of ever-tighter immigration and asylum rules and regulations, and a move towards stricter views on these subjects by both the Social Democrats and the Socialist People’s Party, the number of immigrants and asylum-seekers is growing.

Both politicians noted that the return of failed Iraqi asylum-seekers under the agreement between Denmark and Iraq is a problem, partly because of the way (and the debate about) the police detained Iraqis in Brorson’s Church in Copenhagen, partly because their return is regarded by many as forcible and not peaceful; as required by the agreement; and partly because of the recent denial by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki that Iraq actually has signed an agreement with Denmark for repatriation of Iraqis against their will.

This led Margrethe Vestager to call on Minister of Refugee, Immigration and Integration Affairs Birthe Rønn Hornbech to “…clear her desk and find out whether Denmark actually has a repatriation agreement with Iraq, and what it entails, and tell us about it.”

Immigration and integration again overshadow the economy as the main subject of political debate in the run-up to the Danish parliamentary election, which must be held by November 2011, Peter Mogensen told the Copenhagen Voice. He believes the present Liberal-Conservative government will wait at least until the spring of 2011 before calling the election, so it can reap the benefits of the various initiatives aimed at helping Denmark ride out the economic crisis.

Margrethe Vestager told the Copenhagen Voice that she sees a need for a longer-term economic plan for Denmark. She also explained how the Social Liberals differ from the Social Democrats and the Socialist People’s Party on immigration.

Both commented on the current political situation and the possibility of a Social Democratic/Socialist People’s Party/Social Liberal coalition taking power.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 7 October 2009

Changes to the rules for family reunification have led young people from ethnic minorities to marry later in life, a new report from the Danish National Centre for Social Research shows. The new rules have also resulted in higher emigration to Sweden and to a new form of marriage - ‘commuter marriages’. But the trend in forced marriages is difficult to quantify.

Changes to the regulations for family reunification in recent years have led young people from ethnic minorities to marry later in life, a report just published by the Danish National Centre for Social Research (SFI) shows.

Whereas 30% of 21-year-old women from ethnic minorities were married before the new regulations, this fell to 10% after they took effect in 2002.

The report, ‘Ændrede familiesammenføringsregler. Hvad har de nye regler betydet for pardannelsesmønstret blandt etniske minoriteter? (Altered family reunification regulations. What is the impact of the new regulations on the pattern for forming couples among ethnic minorities?)’, also concludes that the new rules have resulted in a fall in the number of family reunifications with spouses from the couples’ country of origin. This fall is particularly large among people aged 20-23.

But regulations have only resulted in a limited rise in the number of young people who marry residents of Denmark, no matter whether they come from an ethnic minority or are ethnic Danes.

In fact, few young people from ethnic minorities marry Danish residents of the same or different ethnic origin. The SFI researchers say this can result from the relatively small size of the ethnic groups. But it may also be due to different attitudes towards marriage held by men and women in the ethnic minorities, and that they do not look to these groups for possible spouses.

“As with the increase in age of marriage and its consequent fall in the number of family reunified spouses, this situation can also reflect a development that existed already in 2002, when the new rules came into force,” the researchers say.

“There can also be traditional arranged marriages between young people who both live in Denmark,” they add.

Other conclusions from the report are that the new regulations have resulted in higher emigration to Sweden and to a new form of marriage - ‘commuter marriages’.

The researchers who wrote the report say that it is difficult to give a picture of the development in forced marriages, partly because of limited statistics resulting from a lack of systematic registration of approaches about forced marriages to authorities and advice centres.

“The professionals we have interviewed disagree about whether the changed rules have resulted in a fall in the number of forced marriages,” the researchers say in the report. “In fact, it is their experience that forced marriages are an increasingly important reason why woman approach e.g. crisis centres for women. But that could be due to a change in attitude among the young woman and to a more open approach to the subject.”

The SFI report notes a rising trend among young people from ethnic minorities - especially those of Pakistani descent and those aged 25 - to emigrate to Sweden.

The report lists the Danish legislation, the possibility of cheaper housing in Sweden, and a more positive Swedish integration effort as reasons for moving to Sweden.

Among the results of the new family reunification regulations are ‘commuter marriages’, where one spouse lives in Denmark and the other in his or her land of origin.

“This means that the couple live separately for shorter or longer periods and are only together for instance when the partner living abroad can get a tourist visa to Denmark,” the SFI researchers say. “Such ‘commuter marriages’ seem to suffer from a certain turbulence - not least for the children who are born in Denmark.”

The researchers say it is impossible to determine how many ‘commuter marriages’ there are.

The SFI researchers also studied marriages that were not registered under and are not covered by the Danish law - for example marriages that are contracted with a religious blessing but which have no legal validity in Denmark.

“This type of religious blessing exists among immigrants with Muslim background, but they cannot be used to achieve family reunification,” the researchers say.

“Non-registered marriages in Islamic communities give men and women different possibilities for divorce, which can leave the women in a problematic situation,” the researchers add. “This is recognised by imams we have interviewed. They try to alleviate the problem in various ways, for example through marriage contracts.”

While young people with an ethnic minority background are aware of the 24-year rule, which stipulates the minimum age for family reunification, the SFI report notes that they are less aware of the rule stipulating that both spouses’ aggregate connection to Denmark must be greater than their aggregate connection to another country before a marriage-related family reunification can take place.

The SFI study and report were commissioned and paid for by the Ministry for Refugee, Immigration and Integration Affairs.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 12 October 2009

The thinktank Cevea wants to be a meeting-place for centre-left politics and more than just a network.

Cevea, a thinktank that opened in September 2008 and which launched a new website last Friday, wants to be a meeting-place for centre-left politics and more than just a network.

The thinktank sees itself as an independent progressive alternative to liberal and right-wing blogs and thinktanks, with inspiration from progressive thinktanks and movements in other countries.

Cevea says “develops progressive ideas for a future Denmark based on freedom, fairness and community. These values have been consistent for the progressive left and the labour movement that has wanted to create European welfare societies without armed revolution. In the 21st century we have learned that the market alone cannot control the development of society. But neither can the politicians of the competitive democracy. There is a need for grand political ideas and leadership.”

Using the latest available knowledge and its values as the starting point, Cevea produces analyses, policy proposals, op-eds and a popular journal “that together should set a progressive agenda in the political debate as well as inspire decision makers and opinion formers.”

The new website that joins the thinktank’s production will be interactive, easily accessible and carry blogs by its own staff and members as well as contributions from people outside the movement.

The new website that joins the thinktank’s production will be interactive, easily accessible and carry blogs by its own staff and members as well as contributions from people outside the movement.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice 13 October 2009

Voluntary work by the civil society is a vital supplement to the work carried out by the public and private sectors in Denmark, and the voluntary sector should play a larger role in public welfare and social policy in particular, a survey carried out for the centre-left thinktank Cevea shows. Voluntary work has great potential for integration. Cevea has published 22 recommendations that politicians can implement today make greater use of and give greater recognition to civil society’s voluntary work.

There will always be a need for voluntary work - the third sector - and volunteers often do a better job than the public and private sectors, a survey conducted for the centre-left thinktank Cevea shows.

According to the survey, which was carried out by Interresearch in collaboration with Frivilligt Forum, an umbrella organisation for groups involved in volunteer work, and the Sports Confederation of Denmark (DIF), 46% of the people polled believe that volunteers do a better job than the public and private sectors; 15.9% disagree. 77.8% say there will always be a need for voluntary work.

Cevea agrees with the people polled that voluntary work is a vital supplement to the work carried out by the public and private sectors - and volunteers should be used where they can supplement and support the other sectors where they can develop solutions to concrete challenges.

According to the thinktank, volunteers have involvement in and responsibility for their work; they have insight into the tasks performed and proximity to the people receiving their services; they are flexible and full of ideas for doing the work; and they enjoy respect and mutual recognition in social communities.

“These values in particular have a potential in the renewal of public welfare and social policy,” Cevea says. Here, civil society in the form of the voluntary sector should play a much larger role. This also applies to the broader voluntary work carried out in other areas - such as sports clubs, housing associations and hobby organisations - where democracy and the feeling of togetherness in society are developed.

Voluntary work has great potential for integration - the children of immigrants can be involved in sports, where each game has rules, and through this involvement can get a stronger attachment to and understanding for society in a broader context.

But Danish politicians do not give the third sector the same degree of recognition that it receives in other countries, Cevea says.

“In Washington DC, President Barack Obama moved the civil society into the White House when he moved in, while former British Prime Minister Tony Blair opened an ambitious ‘Office for the Third Sector’ in 2002,” the thinktank says. “At the same time, both Norway and Sweden have adopted ambitious national action plans for developing and supporting civil society and for realising the potentials of voluntary work.”

According to Cevea, if unpaid voluntary work in Denmark had the same value as it does in Sweden, it would employ 130,000 people and have a value of about DKr 56 billion a year, equalling about 3.9% of gross national product.

In a report, ‘Borgerens inddragelse - afdækning af det frivilliges potentiale (Involving the people - the potential of voluntary work)’, Cevea has published 22 recommendations that politicians can implement immediately to make greater use of and give greater recognition to civil society’s voluntary work.

• A new national holiday should be introduced to draw attention to the work of the civil society.
• It should be possible for conscripts to do service in a voluntary organisation.
• Popular sports with a broad base should be strengthened nationally and locally, and tasks that sports organisations carry out for authorities should be financed by the authorities.
• University students should receive merits for work experience jobs in voluntary organisations.
• Middle-level managers in voluntary organisations should be trained at a new academy.
• The government should create a ministry for voluntary work.
• The government should develop a national action plan that promotes the potential of voluntary work.
• All legislation about voluntary work should be collated in one voluntary work law.
• The existing jungle of funding sources should be replaced fewer, transparent sources that are part of the annual state budget.
• Voluntary initiatives should be financed by funding aimed at the start-up, development and stabilisation phases.
• There should be a separate funding source for documentation and evaluation of voluntary work.
• A national knowledge centre for voluntary work should be created.
• A ‘voluntary work town of the year’ should be named annually.
• Centres for voluntary work should be the local anchorage for the broad-based voluntary work.
• Voluntary work centres should have more resources that are earmarked so they can meet their extra responsibilities.
• The voluntary work centres must develop local strategies for targeted information campaigns about voluntary work.
• The state and local authorities should introduce a policy of buying products and services from the voluntary sector.
• All local authorities should encourage their service institutions such as nursing homes to collaborate with voluntary work centres in creating associations of relatives to people in the service institutions.
• There should more non-profit institutions with greater autonomy.
• Agreements between public authorities and voluntary organisations should include trade unions to for demarcations between the work of volunteers and professional staff.
• Unused funds for voluntary work in one local authority should be transferred to local authorities that have used too much on voluntary work.
• Funds should be earmarked for voluntary projects aimed at increasing integration of immigrants.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 16 October 2009

The European Union sees civilian reconstruction as an essential part of state-building, but the EU is ill-equipped to offer the strategic and development assistance needed, a new report shows. The EU should rethink its entire approach to foreign interventions, appoint senior envoys in each of the countries at greatest risk of instability, and set up a ‘European Institute for Peace’.

Although the European Union extols the importance of civilian reconstruction as an essential part of state-building with the aim of preventing fragile states from becoming failing states, the EU is ill-equipped to offer the strategic and development assistance needed, a new report from the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) indicates.

The report, ‘Can the EU rebuild failing states? A review of Europe’s civilian capacities’, states that most EU missions remain small, lack ambition and are strategically irrelevant. If the European Union is to deliver on its potential, then it will need to rethink its entire approach to foreign interventions.

According to the report’s authors, the EU’s member states lack properly trained civilian experts - from police officers and economic advisors to sanitation and irrigation specialists - that can bring stability to the world’s trouble spots.

The authors ascribe this to three factors:

• The EU breaks its promises and significantly under-staffs key international missions.
• The EU still relies on its ‘Bosnia template’ for its missions and ignores reality on the ground.
• The European Commission and the European Council weaken missions by trying to micro-manage while lacking the necessary expertise to do so.

The EU has a shortage of 1,500 personnel across its 12 ongoing state-building missions. None of the EU member states have deployed half of the civilians they promised in the 2004 Civilian Headline Goal process.

All eyes are on Afghanistan, but the EU’s police mission there is at half its authorised strength.

Models that may have worked in Bosnia after NATO stabilised the country cannot simply be transferred to other regions, the report says.

For instance, when the European Union was planning its 2005-2006 mission to the Congo, it soon became apparent that it had not taken into account the sheer size of the country and the magnitude of government corruption, rendering its mission largely irrelevant.

When Paddy Ashdown was charged with co-ordinating the international community’s efforts in Bosnia as both the EU’s special representative and UN envoy, the European Commission insisted on creating its own plan for the country’s development, ignoring the proposal for police reform seen by Ashdown’s office as central to the country’s development.

The report calls on the EU and its member states to:

• Scrap the ‘Bosnia template’ and rethink its entire approach to foreign interventions, with a focus on speed, security and self-sufficiency, with rapid deployment of the right specialists, officials and administrative staff who must operate closely with local populations.
• Appoint senior envoys in each of the 20 countries that the EU considers to be at greatest risk of instability. This would give the EU a more seamless approach to foreign interventions, preventing crisis before they erupt and offering immediate assistance on the ground when they do.
• Set up a ‘European Institute for Peace’ as the standard-setter of member states’ civilian missions training.
• Ensure each member state devises a national action plan to ensure that all recruitment, training, funding, debriefing and planning targets are met.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 13 October 2009

Almost a third of the people in Denmark believe that the consequences of immigration are mainly negative, while nearly one-fifth believe the consequences are mainly positive, the Cepos thinktank says in a new note about immigration. The negative attitude is related more to societal problems arising from immigration than to the differences between immigrants and Danes. Immigrants say they must be treated as individuals to enhance integration.

While 47% of the people in Denmark believe that the positive and negative consequences of immigration are equally divided, 32% believe that the consequences of immigration are ‘more negative than positive’ or ‘exclusively negative’, and 18% believe the consequences are ‘more positive than negative’ or ‘exclusively positive’.

Cepos says that although general attitude cannot be said to predominantly negative, the aggregate result does have a negative trend. The negative attitude is related more to societal problems arising from immigration than to the differences between immigrants and Danes, the thinktank adds.

To discover what actually drives the scepticism towards immigration, Cepos commissioned Statistics Denmark to conduct a questionnaire study focusing on a number of concrete problems that are related to immigration in the public debate.

The Cepos report shows that people living in Denmark believe there are real problems arising from immigration. For example, 70% of the people asked said they believe it to be a problem that women have other rights among ethnic minorities; 68% saw the different behaviour of male children of non-western immigrants in school compared with boys of ethnic Danish parents as a problem; that comparatively more non-western immigrants commit crimes that ethnic Danes is a problem according to 67% of those asked; and 65% said it is a problem that non-western immigrants are often more religious than ethnic Danes.

Coupling the assessments of the consequences of immigration held by the people asked to their assessment of problem areas, societal problems such as unemployment, crime, and problems at school are more important in the overall assessment than aspects related to adaptation in private life, such as degree of religious affiliation and attitude towards alcohol, Cepos says.

The thinktank added that social position has significant importance for the attitudes of the people asked: people with higher incomes are more concerned about social integration than people with low incomes, it says.

“On the basis of this study, the conclusion must be that Danes are not as negative towards the consequences of immigration as the picture that is often painted,” Cepos said. “At the same time the report shows that negative attitude that does exist is related more to societal problems arising from immigration than to the differences between immigrants and Danes.

“If you want a more positive attitude to immigration among Danes, the greatest positive effect will arise through policies that solve these problems - such as an effective judicial policy, greater motivation to join the labour market and greater consequences for disturbances at school,” the Cepos thinktank says.

Referring to the chapter on Denmark in a report entitled ‘Muslims in EU Cities’, published in 2007 by the EU Monitoring and Advocacy Program (EUMAP), sociologist Mustafa Hussain, an external lecturer at the Roskilde University Centre, told a meeting yesterday arranged by the European Network Against Racism (ENAR) that 70% Muslims living in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro district - as well as 50% of the district’s inhabitants generally - say that, over the past five years, they have seen a rise in prejudice against people showing their religious affiliations.

“Danes are the people in the European Union showing the greatest Islamophobia,” he added.

According to the EUMAP report, one of the most debated publications has been a nationwide survey of the attitude of Danes towards ethnic minorities. This found that 37% of Danes would not like a Muslim for a neighbour, but, interestingly, when the adjective ‘Muslim’ was replaced by ‘a person from another race’, the proportion fell to 18%.

The report adds that there are two main schools of thought on public perceptions of Muslims in Denmark.

“The first finds that there has been no significant change in the public attitudes towards the immigrants, and that intolerance towards Muslims is rather a reflection of the fact that Danes are overwhelmingly secularised,” the report states. “By contrast, the other school finds that the situation has deteriorated since the late 1980s and that there has been a change of direction in perception, attitudes and institutional behaviour.”

In comparison with other EU countries, the EUMAP report notes, much of the research on perception and attitudes in Denmark remains at a rudimentary stage. Nonetheless, it can be concluded that the ways in which Muslims are talked about in the public sphere and the daily media reduces the complexity of the cultural variations among Muslims and reproduces the existing stereotypes of them.

“Ethnic relations have become much more strained today, and intolerance and right-wing extremism has increased,” the report states. “Public opinion has become more critical towards Muslims, who, in the popular perception, are conceived as a culturally homogenous group of ‘foreigners’ and a binary opposition of all that is Danish. Domestic observers and social science researchers have noted lately that Denmark, with its Muslim population of barely 170,000, has become a staunchly anti-Muslim nation. After some of the most obnoxious xenophobic propaganda during the general elections in November 2001, Denmark attracted a great deal of international criticism.”

Asmaa Abdol-Hamid and other speakers told the meeting that Muslims are not a homogeneous group - they come from many countries and the religion they share is actually made up of several sets of belief and sects.

Asmaa Abdol-Hamid, a social worker and politician, argued that immigrants - no matter what their background is - should be treated as individuals, as this would help the integration process, which is really something that occurs in people’s minds.

The tone of the public debate on integration is a burden on immigrants, who feel that it is more and more difficult to achieve ‘Danishness’ as the definition of Danish culture becomes increasingly narrow.

y Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 21 October 2009

Lots of exercise to raise the pulse, and a diet with many fruits and vegetables and little meat and fats will not only keep your body in shape, but also keep your brain sharp, according to Milena Penkowa, a doctor of medicine, researcher and professor at the Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology at the Panum Institute under the University of Copenhagen.

Milena gave some lectures over the past week at Experimentarium, the hands-on science exhibition centre in Hellerup, in connection with the centre’s new theme exhibition about the brain.

As the lights were switched off around us, Milena told the Copenhagen Voice that the brain likes to be challenged. Solving crosswords and sudokus and learning a new language are therefore good ways of massaging the 1.4 kg organ that is so vital to us - and can help us postpone, and even partly recover from, the onslaught of brain-related illnesses such as Alzheimer’s disease.

The exhibition’s slogan is ‘Use it or lose it!’ and the 45 activities will give your brain a real work-out ‘because your brain can benefit from regular training just like your body - all your life’.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 22 October 2009

Further increases in public health spending could result in additional funding through taxes, increasing the already high tax distortions in Denmark, the independent chairmen of the Economic Council (the ‘wise men’) say in their latest report on the Danish economy, published today. Even if a tight control of health expenditure is possible, there is a need for a permanent increase in taxes or structural reforms to finance the increase in health expenditure as a proportion to GDP.

Danish health care policies are based on the principle that the health care sector should provide easy and equal access to health care services to all Danish citizens a principle that is generally accepted as a central part of the Danish welfare state.

Health spending equals 10% of Denmark’s total gross domestic product (GDP). The large majority of the expenditure is financed by taxes, while direct user fees only account for 15% of the total. Total health expenditure (private and public) has grown faster than GDP since 1970 in most OECD countries. The growth in Danish health expenditure has been more moderate, but from 2000 health expenditure has been increasing and health expenditure accounts for an increasing share of GDP.

This should not necessarily be seen as a problem as the increase may very well reflect citizens’ preferences for higher quality health care.

However, as the main part of health expenditure is financed by taxes, further increases in public health expenditure can lead to a public deficit or may require additional tax funding, the economic ‘wise men’ say.

They note two important factors affecting health spending: cohort effects and reduced mortality. The large cohorts born after World War Two will require more health care as they get older. Increases in life expectancy will further increase the number of elderly requiring health care.

A significant share of health services is provided to individuals approaching the end of their lives (terminal costs), and proximity to death has a significant impact on health costs of the individual, the ‘wise men’ say.

They add that the increase in health expenditure is likely to put pressure on public expenditure over the next decades. It is therefore worth considering alternatives to tax-based financing of health expenditure.

The economic ‘wise men’ say that one alternative is to shift from tax payments to compulsory social health insurance, which is currently used in countries like Germany, the Netherlands and France.

However, it is not obvious that social health insurance will be cheaper than tax-funding. An insurance payment system must be developed in addition to the already existing tax collection system. Furthermore, it suffers from the same incentive problems as the tax system. For example, patients’ demand for health care does not take into account the cost of treatment, and activity-paid health care providers have little incentive to limit treatments to patients.

Also, the ‘wise men’ add, it seems that the social health insurance system is generally less redistributional than tax, although this depends on the design of the insurance payments. If the insurance payment scheme has the same distributional effects as the tax-financed system, then the distortionary labour market effects are also likely to be the similar.

User charges finance 15% of total Danish health expenditure. They are mainly applied on dental services, physiotherapy, and medication. There are no user charges, for instance, on visits to the casualty departments or hospital meals, which is the case in other Nordic countries.

The economic ‘wise men’ recommended that user charges should apply on more health services, the existing budget for user charges, so that the user charges are reduced on some health services and increased on others. By spreading the user charges on more health services, they may be used to regulate the demand for other services than dental services, physiotherapy, and medication.

The number of employer-paid supplementary health insurances in Denmark has increased rapidly in this decade and one million people were covered in 2008. This increase is encouraged by a tax exemption to the employee, given that the employer offers the insurance to all employees. The tax exemption yields an indirect subsidy to the supplementary health insurances. The exemption is only given to people in the labour market and may therefore not be consistent with the principle of easy and equal access to health care services. For these reasons, the ‘wise men’ recommended that the tax exemption should be abolished.

Instead of increased funding, the increasing health expenditure could be limited by increasing the efficiency of the health sector through competitive supply of health services, the ‘wise men’ say. However, the cut in expenditure will be small and limited extent, as only a small share of the health services can be supplied competitively.

One (extreme) alternative to a health care contribution tax is a restrained development in health expenditure that ensures that health expenditure as a proportion to GDP is kept constant at the current level, the economic ‘wise men’ say. Due to the pressure on health expenditure caused by aging, this implies a slower growth rate in health expenditure per person in a given age group than growth in GDP and is a way to secure fiscal sustainability.

A less radical possibility is to let the health expenditure increase at the same pace as average income and the development of demographic factors such as the size of cohorts and aging. Such a development in health expenditure presumes a distinctive tightening of expenditure control and is hardly realistic in the light of the present focus on fast treatment of patients. Even if a tight control of health expenditure is possible, there is a need for a permanent increase in taxes or structural reforms to finance the increase in health expenditure as a proportion to GDP, the economic ‘wise men’ say.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 22 October 2009

The Danish economy will recover slowly from the ongoing financial crisis over time, but from a very low starting point, the independent chairmen of the Economic Council (the ‘wise men’) say in their latest report on the Danish economy, published today. But it will take years before the Danish production is at the same level as before the crisis. Denmark needs a new plan to ensure long-run fiscal sustainability.

Like the rest of the world, Denmark was in 2008 hit by the most severe economic downturn since the Second World War, but the fall in Danish gross domestic product (GDP) started in the beginning of 2008, and thus earlier than in most other countries, the economic ‘wise men’ say.

The GDP decrease has also been greater in Denmark, partly because the capacity pressure was considerable in the Danish economy in 2007 and 2008, and therefore there were low Danish growth rates in prospect, even before the crisis.

GDP fell sharply in the second half of 2008, and the fall continued with increased strength in the first half of 2009. Second-quarter GDP is 7% lower than a year ago.

However, the ‘wise men’ say, there are indicators implying that the bottom will soon be reached. The decrease in industrial production has ended, and the fall in private consumption has slowed. Also the business and consumer expectations of the future have moved upward, and the more optimistic mood is reflected in the stock prices, which have increased by 50% since March. The signs of recovery are even more pronounced abroad, and some countries (including Germany) actually experienced positive growth rates in the second quarter of 2009.

Therefore, a recovery of the Danish economy is in prospect, but from a very low starting point. However, there are several reasons to expect a slow recovery, and that it will take years before the Danish production is at the same level as before the crisis.

An important reason to expect a relatively weak recovery in Denmark is that households have suffered considerable wealth losses, in particular due to lower house prices. The lower wealth and the prospect of increasing unemployment will tend to keep private consumption at a low level, in spite of increases in disposable income.

Another reason to expect a weak recovery is that public finances have deteriorated in both Denmark and abroad, which implies a need for fiscal consolidation. It is expected that public finances abroad will be tightened along with the improvement of the economies, and this will contribute to lower growth on the Danish export markets the following years.

A third reason for expecting a weak recovery is that, even though the conditions in the financial sector have been partly normalised, there is still a considerable need for consolidation in response to the large losses the sector has suffered during the crisis. This will restrain the growth in lending and thereby the increase in economic activity. Restrained lending will probably be complemented by tighter regulation of the financial sector, e.g. through more restrictive international capital requirements for banks.

Finally, the economic ‘wide men’ expect that monetary policy will return to more normal conditions as the state of countries’ economies improves. This will, within a few years, imply higher interest rates and more restrictive opportunities for banks to acquire liquid funds in the central banks.

GDP is expected to fall by around 4.75% from 2008 to 2009. The downturn is reflected in all of the private demand components. Private consumption is expected to fall by 5% percent, exports by 10% and investments by 15%.

Private consumption falls in spite of a considerable increase in disposable income, among others due to tax cuts and the release of the Special Pension Savings, which is a compulsory pension payment that all employees paid in the period 1997 to 2004. Tax cuts will also increase disposable income in 2010, and thereby tend to stimulate private consumption.

However it is expected that the ratio of private consumption to income will fall, because of higher unemployment and lower house prices. Based on this, private consumption is only expected to increase by around 1.75 in 2010.

The ‘wise men’ say the Danish housing market is characterised by falling prices, longer selling periods and a marked fall in construction activity. Housing prices were at an unsustainable high level under the preceding boom, and housing prices have already fallen by almost 20% compared to the peak in 2007. With the increasing unemployment in mind it is expected that housing prices will fall by around 5% from 2009 to 2010. Starting from 2011, housing prices are expected to rise again.

Fixed business investments have already fallen markedly due to the lower demand, and they are expected also to fall in 2010.

Both imports and exports have fallen heavily as a response to the economic crisis in Denmark and abroad. Imports are expected to fall by around 12% in 2009, and exports by around 10%, but the decline in exports is expected to turn into an increase in the second half of 2009.

Several international institutions have revised their estimates of the global economic growth upward; growth in countries buying Danish exports will turn from -4% in 2009 to around 1.75% percent in 2010, and increasing to around 3.5% in 2012.

The noticeable fall in production has not yet been reflected in a corresponding decrease in employment, because the productivity has continued to fall, the economic ‘wise men’ say. This large productivity gap implies a potential for large increases in productivity in the following years, but it also implies a reduction in the number in employment toward 2011. The total fall in employment from 2008 to 2011 is estimated to be around 160,000 persons.

The fall in employment is not expected to be fully reflected in the number of registered unemployed, due to a cyclical fall in the total workforce. It is estimated that the number of unemployed will increase to around 170,000 persons in 2011, which is 125,000 higher than the historical low level in the summer of 2008.

The higher unemployment has also lowered the rate of wage increases, which is expected to remain at around 2.5% in the following years. This development implies a further deterioration of the Danish wage competitiveness, even though the domestic wage increases are at a historical low.

According to the economic ‘wise men’, the state of the economy has contributed to a sharp deterioration of public finances. It is expected that a surplus of DKK 60 billion in 2008 will be turned into a deficit at around DKK 90 billion in 2010. This is primarily due to a cyclical fall in tax revenues and an increase in unemployment expenditures. This, however, is supplemented by a discretionary fiscal easing, through tax cuts and increased expenditures, of around DKK 45 billion.

In 2009, the government’s fiscal policy will stimulate economic growth and reduce unemployment. This is due to increased public consumption and investment and also tax cuts. The general government budget for next year is not yet final, but fiscal easing of about DKK 20 billion has already been planned for 2010. The easing in 2010 is mainly due to the tax cuts as part of a tax reform that is underfinanced in the short run, but which the ‘wise men’ believe will have a neutral impact on the general government budget balance when it is fully implemented.

Because the current economic downturn is expected to be deep and long-lasting, chairmen of the Economic Council recommend further fiscal easing next year through additional public investments of about DKK 10 billion, but the recommended effect can also be achieved through other policy measures.

The fiscal policy recommended will not bring unemployment below its estimated natural rate, even if economic growth becomes somewhat stronger than forecasted. If, on the other hand, growth becomes somewhat weaker than forecasted, there is a risk that high unemployment will lead to an increase in the natural rate of unemployment.

The ‘wise men’ say it is important that expansive fiscal policy during downturns is countered by contractive fiscal policy during upturns, and it is therefore important that new expansive policies do not lead to a permanent increase in public spending. Starting an already planned investment project is by definition a temporary measure, as the fiscal tightening begins when the project is finished and spending stops. Thus public investment is a preferred measure in the current situation.

The general government debt under the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) is estimated to reach DKK 700 billion by the end of 2010. This is about DKK 200 billion more than estimated in the central government’s latest Convergence Programme prepared in accordance with the rules in the EU’s Stability and Growth Pact. The increase in debt is primarily due to weak growth and a high degree of automatic fiscal stabilizers, which weakens the general government budget balance, but the Government‘s discretionary fiscal measures are also enhancing debt.

The economic ‘wise men’ say their new outlook makes it clear that Denmark needs a new plan to ensure long-run fiscal sustainability. The sustainability challenge must be recalculated with regard to the latest information and the calculations should take the increasing health expenses into account.

A new sustainability plan should include concrete measures for:

• Labour market reforms, including reforms of the early retirement scheme and the unemployment benefit system.
• Postponing the retirement age.
• Dropping the tax freeze on property and other nominal fixed non-inflation-adjusted taxes. The ‘wise men’ recommend adoption of a capital gains tax on the sales value of owner-occupied dwellings.
• Fulfilling the government’s objectives for education and greenhouse gas emissions.
• A public investment plan as an important part of both the short-term stabilization policy and longer-term structural policy as e.g. investments in infrastructure can increase productivity.

The economic ‘wise men’ say the necessary economic reforms should be carried through the parliament as soon as possible, while the reforms could be implemented later and over several years when economic growth has recovered.

The high growth in economic activity and employment in recent years have led to an increase in jobs for many low-skilled workers with difficulties in getting a foothold on the labour market. It is important that these people do not lose this foothold as employment falls. In a few years, the Danish economy will once again lack labour, and active labour market policy measures should therefore target this group.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 29 October 2009

Combating global warming is a way to create renewed growth, prosperity and jobs, while the costs of inaction are too high, according to business leaders in the run-up to COP15, the UN Climate Change Conference being held in Copenhagen in December.

Combating global warming and mitigating climate change demand large investments that will be spread over many years and will have an impact long after the people who are alive today are gone from this world. Businesses will make those investments even if COP15 does not agree on a replacement for the Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gas emissions, even if Copenhagen is only one more step on the path to such an agreement sometime in the future.

But without the lead that agreement at COP15 would give, positive worldwide economic development will be slow.

Such was the message authored by leaders of businesses and industries that was presented yesterday at a conference hosted by the magazine Monday Morning.

In their statement, the captains of industry “urge governments to show leadership and commitment in this final phase and help sustain our economy and the environment. We call upon heads of state to go to Copenhagen in December and seize this historic opportunity.”

They argued that a successful agreement at COP15 can ensure that the opportunity to create more, new green jobs is not lost; that the huge investment potential does not disappear into thin air; and that the future of the global market place is ensured.

Agreement could create as many as 10 million new green jobs, unleash huge investments in new, low-carbon markets and thereby spur economic growth, said Jeff Immelt, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of General Electric (GE).

“In business you always say when is the right time, and we think the right time is now,” Immelt said. “If you have high unemployment, this is one of the ways to create jobs. Everyone wants to lead in green technology - every Prime Minister, every President. The pipeline is very rich. Entrepreneurship is strong. Corporate commitment is high. We should not see technology as a barrier but a facilitator. The investments we make will be around long after we are gone and creating them without a framework will be more difficult. Countries have to decide whether they are leaders or followers.”

Adding that there must be a price for carbon and a cap on carbon emissions, to encourage development of the best technologies, Immelt said GE and other big companies have really said it is time for the US to drive forward the need for solutions to climate change.

The industrial leaders stressed that business will play its part, “but it is critical that the negotiations create an environment that will unlock the potential of business to do what it does best: to invest profitably, to innovate and bring affordable low carbon products and services to billions of consumers around the world.

“Copenhagen can mark a new beginning. It’s important to seize this opportunity now,” the industrial leaders said.

“If we miss this opportunity, it will not come back and we lose a global momentum that has been building over several years,” said Danish Minister for Climate and Energy Connie Hedegaard. “In case of failure, business will be the biggest loser. So I warmly welcome the message today from business. I really hope that their voice is heard all over the world. I strongly support their message. We must not let the world off the hook.”

“Business leaders must state loud and clear – as this impressive group does today – that combating global warming is a way to create renewed growth and prosperity and that the costs of inaction are too high,” said Erik Rasmussen, founder of the Copenhagen Climate Council. “We need to hear this voice in order to build the necessary political confidence.”

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 4 November 2009

“We don’t have bread, we don’t have water - what do we want atoms for?”

According to Mohsen Makhmalbaf, that is what the Iranians are saying about their country’s attempts to enrich uranium for power generation (or nuclear weapons, depending on who you believe). And the comments are symptomatic of the popular dissatisfaction with the regime in Iran after the controversial re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president earlier this year.

Makhmalbaf, prize-winning film director, author and editor, was the spokesman for Mir-Hossein Moussavi, the reform politician who also stood as presidential candidate, and for the Green Movement.

Addressing a meeting on Monday, arranged by the Politiken newspaper, Makhmalbaf said the opposition Green Movement has the support of about 40 million of Iran’s 70 million citizens, the young, the middle class and the educated.

“All those who want change support the Green Movement,” he claimed.

The poorly educated support Ahmadinejad in the hope that the president will introduce changes that will benefit them, while the Revolutionary Guard supports the president to ensure that their grip on the largest part of the nation’s economy remains intact.

The Green Movement was started shortly after the presidential election, when protesters demanded removal of Ahmadinejad from office. Green was originally the symbol of Moussavi’s campaign, but after the election it became a symbol of unity and hope for the protesters.

Although the Iranian government prohibited any gatherings of protesters in Tehran and across the country, significantly slowed down internet access and censored any form of media supporting the opposition, hundreds of thousands of Iranians marched in defiance. Many were arrested, and several were killed by the police and militia forces Basij.

“The government has used everything in its arsenal of weapons to suppress the Green Movement, but has failed,” added another speaker, Hossein Bagherzadeh, a human rights activist.

Bagherzadeh’s concern about how the demonstrations planned for today would develop was well placed. The demonstrations mark the 30th anniversary of occupation of the US embassy in Teheran by conservative Iranian students, but also support the Green Movement.

Reports indicate that police have used tear-gas, and possibly arms, against the demonstrators, while the Basij militia have reportedly changed into civilian clothing to infiltrate the demonstrations and arrest demonstrators.

The meeting’s third speaker, journalist Alireza Nurizadeh, the director of the Centre for Arab and Iranian Studies in London, said the Green Movement represents “civilised opposition to the Iranian regime”.

He cast doubt on the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad as president: “Ahmadinejad is only in power because of Khameini and the Revolutionary Guards.”

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 8 November 2009

There is a strong political momentum towards an ambitious outcome at the UNFCCC climate conference in Copenhagen next month, and there a real dedication among leaders that we need such an outcome, Danish Prime Minster Lars Løkke Rasmussen told the finance ministers of the G20 group of the world’s economies. “It will be a failure if we miss this deadline,” he added.

Addressing the finance ministers of the G20 group of the world’s economies, meeting in St Andrews in Scotland, Danish Prime Minster Lars Løkke Rasmussen said that, with exactly one month to COP15 in Copenhagen, the question on everybody’s lips is: ‘can we make it?’.

“Over the last weeks and months I have engaged in intensive consultations with leaders from around the world,” the Danish Prime Minister said. “My impression is this: There is a strong political momentum towards Copenhagen, and a real dedication among leaders that we need an ambitious outcome in Copenhagen. It will be a failure if we miss this deadline.

“That said, it’s also obvious that there is still many difficult issues unresolved. But if we manage to channel the political momentum and dedication into the right mix of efforts, will and constructiveness at the negotiating table, then this deal is possible.”

The Danish government’s objective as host for the COP15 conference is to achieve one agreement with two purposes, Rasmussen said.

The first purpose is to provide political guidance for the UNFCCC negotiations on the new legal framework. These negotiations will stretch beyond COP 15 itself.

“The second [purpose] is to adopt a binding political agreement that would enter into force immediately and hence provide for immediate action to combat global warming,” the Danish Prime minister added.

A former finance minister himself, Rasmussen noted that the G20’s finance ministers “have been asked by your leaders in Pittsburgh to present options for climate financing as a resource for the UN negotiations.”

He said that climate finance is perhaps the most complex issue, but it could also be key to unlocking positions in other areas.

“It is my belief that concrete results in the following three areas will significantly increase the odds of overall success in Copenhagen,” Rasmussen said. “The first issue concerns a new multilateral fund and its governance. I think there could be a role for such a fund, either new or through a reformed existing fund. In case, my advice would be that it should be ready to work immediately.

“The second issue is how we coordinate the broader system of funding through multilateral, regional and bilateral channels. The third issue is the scale and fair distribution of contributions for climate financing.”

He noted that there are still complex questions related to finance. But there is also a strong political momentum to address these questions ahead of December’s meeting.

“I really encourage you to stay engaged all the way to Copenhagen,” the Danish Prime Minister told the G20 finance ministers.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen voice, 8 November 2009

The climate meeting in Barcelona made progress but did not remove all the stones on the road to COP15 in Copenhagen next month. The time for treading water will soon be over and the world’s leaders must then act.

“It would be wrong to say that Barcelona removed all the stones on the road to Copenhagen,” Danish Climate and Energy Minister Connie Hedegaard said in a comment at the close on Friday of the Barcelona UN Climate Change Talks.

“There is still a long way to go, but the negotiators outlined the possibilities that a climate deal in Copenhagen can build on in important areas such as technology transfer, climate adaptation and the question of forests in developing countries,” Hedegaard said. “This was fully in line with my opening address. The negotiation text must list some real choices, so the politicians must show that they dare back them with action.”

The Danish minister said
Barcelona showed that the countries are very much aware that the crunch comes the next time they meet.

“The African countries’ stance at the start of the negotiations underlined that they are very concerned about the consequences of global warming and that they expect the industrialised countries to deliver at Copenhagen,” Connie Hedegaard said. The African countries’ unanimity “sends a clear signal to the industrialised countries that they must come with concrete figures in Copenhagen – for both reduction targets and finance.

“The next stop is Copenhagen,” Hedegaard said. “This is where the last round of negotiations takes place. There will be no more time for treading water. In a month, the world’s leaders must show that they dare deliver a binding, ambitious and global agreement.”

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 9 November 2009

Racism and discriminatory practices take place every day, says ENAR, the European Network Against Racism, in its 2008 Shadow Report, ‘Racism in Denmark’. Many academic surveys, reports from distinguished organisations and NGOs have documented the unequal treatment given minorities in Denmark.

In its statistics, the Danish government describes non-European communities in a particular manner, according to ENAR, the European Network Against Racism.

Discriminated groups vary in ethnicity, cultures and religions, but, in the last few years, an open and hostile atmosphere towards Muslim groups has become very visible in all spheres of life, the organisation says.

Racism and discriminatory practices take place every day, as evidenced by many academic surveys, reports from distinguished organisations and NGOs, which have documented beyond doubt the unequal treatment given to minorities.

However, the ENAR report states, the single most discriminated area is the labour market - employment opportunities, apprenticeships and the negative views of employers.

In another discriminating area, housing and accommodation, “minorities are often directed by housing societies towards places and quarters where the percentage of socially deprived Danes and various minority groups is already high,” ENAR states. “Having done that, the authorities then call those areas ‘ghettoes’.”

In education there is an important focus on the Danish language, while mother-tongue education for minority children is almost abolished. There are also efforts to spread minority children in as many schools as possible in the name of integration. “The Danish education system is thus becoming a tool in the hands of anti-minority political forces,” the anti-racism organisation says.

In the health sector, children of asylum seeking families are suffering while interpreting facilities are non-existent for women and elderly sick patients.

The relationship between the police and minority youth deteriorated in 2008 due to the increasing use of racial profiling by the authorities in stop-and-search raids in the neighbourhood, ENAR says. Police arrogance has caused friction and stress. Although Danish society has been relatively peaceful until recently, racial violence and crime have accelerated steadily, causing deaths and shootings.

“Right-wing movements take advantage of the negative atmosphere and recruit new members for their cause,” the ENAR report states. “Harassment of Muslim women and Jewish students is a cause for alarm.”

When it comes to accessing goods and services in the private sector, discrimination in discos, bars and entertainment places is still very widespread and out of the control of authorities.

In public services, small minority children are forcefully removed from homes and taken to Danish foster parents - a big issue that minorities feel very strongly about, the organisation says in its report.

“The media are often hostile towards non-European minorities, especially towards Muslim communities,” ENAR says. “The republishing of the caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed in 2008, splashing headlines in terror suspect cases before the trial or conviction, giving the green light to anti-minority politicians and focusing excessively on the negative stories have created a very bad image of minorities. Media debates as usual focused on Islam, the headscarf, radicalisation, and terrorism by Muslims.”

According to ENAR’s shadow report 2008 on Denmark, such developments have a political and legal context. “In the absence of strong legal protective measures against racism and discrimination and the free reign for politicians to say what they like, minorities have great difficulty in attaining equal rights and opportunities,” ENAR states.

Talking to NGOs, it became clear to ENAR that, in recent years, civil society, which was very active until 2001, has lost hope and faith in a positive change.

“On the anti-discrimination front, the government refuses to officially acknowledge the existence of racism in Denmark,” ENAR says. The government’s action plans “are full of talk about diversity and mono-cultural integration without a concentrated effort to tackle racism and discrimination,” it adds. “The name of the newly established Board of Equal Treatment (which does not deal with racism or discrimination) is a good example. Most of the new laws concerning minorities are actually new restrictions on citizenship, family reunions, asylum and social rights.”

According to ENAR, Denmark has been repeatedly criticised by EU institutions and international organisations, but, due to the lack of sanctions, the government has dismissed all valid criticism.

Successful integration has been linked by the government to the end of third-country nationals entering Denmark. This policy has had the desired effects by reducing asylum and family reunions from Asia, Africa and the Middle East, especially Muslim countries.

“The whole burden of integration has been put on the shoulder of ethnic minorities who are asked to adopt the Danish way of living by discarding their own values and traditions,” ENAR states in the report.

The anti-racism organisation notes that there are few practical remedies against racism and racial profiling, but there is a great focus on anti-terrorism.

Danish anti-terrorism laws are stricter than EU laws, ENAR says, and some cases in 2008 proved that many people were arrested without any substantial proof.

“Such drastic measures have alienated and angered Muslim communities who find themselves targeted because of suspicions and actions of a very tiny number of Muslim individuals,” the organisation adds. “The result of these negative developments is social exclusion, increase in poverty, break up of trust and the ‘us’ versus ‘them’ divide.”

ENAR says it believes that this divide will widen if the Danish media, politicians and local authorities do not come to realise that ethnic and religious minorities are here to stay and that an intercultural society with equal rights and opportunities is the best guarantee for an inclusive society.

“2008 was the European Year for Intercultural Living,” the organisation says. “Minorities hope that the Danish media, politicians and authorities have learnt from this message to not only divert their attention from Danish values but to focus on universal values of respect, accept and understanding for all.”

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 12 November 2009

The daily newspaper Politiken has started a fund-raising campaign in support of Irak Center, which aims at employing failed Iraqi asylum-seekers. The government and the Danish People’s Party will change the law.

The daily newspaper Politiken has started a fund-raising campaign in support of Irak Center, a new initiative that will employ failed Iraqi asylum-seekers in jobs that pay 32,000 Danish kroner a month. This level of income means the Iraqis can apply for work and residence permits in Denmark under a special scheme that also requires the jobs to be done by people with special expertise.

The centre, set up by the newspaper, will employ as many as possible of the 100 or so failed Iraqi asylum-seekers remaining in Denmark after recent forced repatriations of other Iraqis whose asylum applications have been rejected. The Iraqis will provide information about their country and about the conditions for Iraqi asylum-seekers.

“We’ve decided to help a group of rejected asylum-seekers who have been caught up in the system,” Tøger Seidenfaden, Politiken’s editor-in-chief, told the newspaper. “They’ve been living in a grey zone for years. The UN is still issuing warnings against sending them back to Iraq, and they have been unable to get residence permits in Denmark.”

The government and the Danish People’s Party say they will change the law to end “an abuse of the scheme to attract highly educated people and specialists” to Denmark.

Karsten Lauritzen, integration affairs spokesman for the liberals (Venstre), part of the coalition government, told the newspaper that this scheme must not become a loophole “so rejected asylum-seekers can get around the decisions of the Refugee Appeals Board. If Politiken’s initiative is legal, then we must study the legislation closely. I doubt that Politiken’s initiative will fly very far.”

He is supported by Peter Skaarup, integration affairs spokesman for the Danish People’s Party, who doubted that the Danish Immigration Service would give the go-ahead to jobs in the Irak Center, so allowing the rejected Iraqi asylum-seekers to get residence and work permits.

“The Iraqis probably do not have the qualifications to earn 32,000 kroner a month, so this will probably be an evasion of the law,” Skaarup said.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 17 November 2009

Climate and energy ministers meeting in Copenhagen feel a sense of responsibility to ensure that the negotiations for an agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol for greenhouse gas emissions will not last for ever, but next month’s climate summit will not produce the final document wanted by developing countries – a binding agreement for emissions cuts. Climate activists’ “die-in” and calls for debt relief for developing countries added colour to the meeting.

Forty climate and energy ministers meeting in Copenhagen yesterday and today at Pre-COP, the last meeting before COP15, the UN climate summit to be held in Copenhagen next month, felt “a sense of responsibility to ensure that the negotiations for an agreement will not last for ever,” Danish Climate and Energy Minster Connie Hedegaard told journalists after the meeting.

Governments attending COP15 should reach agreement on a replacement for the Kyoto Protocol for greenhouse gas emissions, so global warming will be kept at less than 2°C.

As well as publishing their emissions reductions targets, the governments of the industrialised countries must agree on funding of climate change mitigation initiatives in the developing countries that risk being hard hit by global warming. Disbursements will be for both short-term and longer-term initiatives, and should apply from 2010-2013 and onwards.

But it is clear from recent political statements and today’s press conference that next month’s climate summit will not produce the final document wanted by developing countries – a binding agreement for emissions cuts.

“Copenhagen must deliver,” Hedegaard stressed. “A half agreement is no agreement. However, many issues remain to be resolved.”

Yvo de Boer, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), added that the ministers signalled their strong desire to succeed next month.

“We are expecting the industrialised countries to issue ambitious targets for emissions reduction,” he added.

Noting that the industrialised countries must raise their ambitions from the levels published so far, de Boer added: “The targets fall short of what science says is necessary. The US must also come with its figures.”

The US administration has indicated that President Barack Obama can be expected in Copenhagen if COP15 reaches a political agreement, which is in line with American wishes, at least at a time when the US Senate is debating proposed legislation for climate emissions and energy.

“We’re still talking of a Copenhagen Treaty,” de Boer said, “but this won’t be finalised in Copenhagen.”

Finalisation will presumably be next year.

Acknowledging that there will be a delay before an agreement can be signed, Hedegaard said this delay will not be five or ten years, but a matter of months.

“The 193 countries attending COP15 must sign and ratify the agreement as soon as possible,” she said, so it can replace the Kyoto Protocol when that expires at the end of 2012.

The UNFCC executive secretary now sees political agreement on key issues, with a binding agreement later.

In one interview he mentioned a brief agreement document with three or four annexes. These annexes would contain a list of the individual industrialised countries’ emissions reductions by 2020; details of what larger developing countries such as China and India will do to limit the growth of their emissions; and details of the financial aspects to mitigate the effects of climate change.

The Danish Climate and Energy Ministry said the issues discussed at the Pre-COP meeting included ambitious mid-term emission cuts by industrialised countries, ways and means to finance immediate action in the developing world and the importance of support to developing nations to adapt to climate change.

“At the Pre-COP there has been a very encouraging spirit,” Hedegaard said. “I have heard from everyone around the table today that Copenhagen must be a success. But half an agreement is no agreement. So we are still aiming for full package delivering on all building blocks in accordance with the Bali action plan.

“This gathering of ministers has signaled a strong desire to succeed, to make Copenhagen a real turning point,” de Boer. “Almost every day now, we see new commitments and pledges from both industrialised and developing nations. The political leadership that so many leaders promised at the UN climate summit in September is alive and well … and it will lead us to success in Copenhagen.”

Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen told the 40 assembled ministers that he had just returned from a meeting with leaders gathered for the summit in Singapore of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).

“We had a very encouraging discussion and we reminded ourselves of the mandates and the deadline set at Bali,” Rasmussen said.

“I presented the vision for an ambitious, binding agreement in Copenhagen,” the Danish Prime Minister said. “This agreement provides for immediate and strong action within all areas of the Bali mandates. And sets us on track for a comprehensive legal framework.

“I am pleased with the positive response I got. Also the American President endorsed our approach, implying that all developed countries will need to bring strong reduction targets to the negotiating table in Copenhagen.”

Rasmussen said he believes political leaders can and must “deliver on the substance” in Copenhagen.

“Copenhagen should neither be a stopover nor a tiny stepping stone as some proclaim,” he said. “Let there be no doubt about our intentions. Given the time factor and the situation of individual countries, we must in the coming weeks focus on what is possible, and not let ourselves be distracted by what is not possible.”

The Danish Prime Minister said the Copenhagen Agreement should capture progress already achieved in the negotiations, and at the same time provide for immediate action already from next year.

“The Copenhagen Agreement should be concrete and binding on countries committing to reach targets, to undertake actions, and to provide agreed finance,” Rasmussen said. “Of course, developed countries must take lead by delivering substantial reductions and finance. We need numbers on the table in Copenhagen.

“The Copenhagen Agreement should mandate continued negotiations for a legal outcome and set a deadline for the conclusion. The Danish government firmly believes we should have a legal framework agreed - sooner rather than later.”

He added that the Copenhagen Agreement should have a solid content covering all the Bali building blocks: shared vision, mitigation, adaptation, finance, technology and capacity building.

“This will provide a strong impetus and guidance to further negotiations on a legal framework,” he said.

In addition, the agreement should provide for immediate action in all areas, including mitigation, adaptation and finance. Significant up-front finance should support early adaptation and mitigation efforts as well as capacity building and technology cooperation.

“The world needs an overall, ambitious and binding agreement,” said Sweden’s Minister for the Environment, Andreas Carlgren. “This job must be done now, not put off to the future. This task must be done in Copenhagen. Our meeting has confirmed that we will get a binding agreement with all the key elements and clear targets for all the world’s countries in Copenhagen. As a result of the Copenhagen meeting and with a clear timetable, the agreement will be given legal form.

“The Chinese and American delegations have confirmed the direction that President Barack Obama and President Jintao agreed on. That must be seen as a step forward even if concrete proposals have yet to be published.”

Outside the Tycho Brahe Planetarium in Copenhagen, which hosted the pre-COP15 meeting, white-clad climate activists ‘died’ to illustrate the 300,000 people a year who perish as a result of inaction on climate change.

“Global citizens demand answers to the critical question of whether leaders will commit in Copenhagen to the core elements of the treaty the world needs,” said Avaaz.org, the main organiser of the demonstration.

What is needed, the organisation added, are ambition carbon cuts, fair funding mounting to US$150 billion in new and additional cash each year, a framework for reaching a legally binding deal, and the development of strong enforcement mechanisms. “Or we’re headed for climate catastrophe.”

Oxfam handed out fliers to underline the developing countries’ rebuff of Denmark’s push for delay in Copenhagen.

The NGO wants a deal in Copenhagen that guarantees binding emissions reductions targets for rich countries and a substantial, ongoing financial package to help poor countries reduce their emissions and adapt to a changing target – and this funding must not be taken from existing overseas aid commitments.

“We have already seen the impacts of climate change on the livelihoods of poor men and women around the world, and worse is to come,” Oxfam said. “We have forecast that the number of people affected by climate-related disasters each year may increase by over 50% by 2015.”

Without urgent action by rich countries, “recent development gains will quickly stall and begin to roll back.”

Climate Debt Agents from MS ActionAid Denmark drew attention to the need for fair funding to developing countries to help them mitigate the impact of climate change.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 21 November 2009

Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen has listed 10 targets to be reached by 2020.

In the year 2020, Denmark:

• shall be among the ten richest countries in the woerld measured in terms of gross national product per capita
• shall be among the three countries in the world with the highest number of growth entrepreneurs
• shall have a labour force among the ten largest in the world as a share of population
• shall have schoolchildren among the top five in the world in reading, mathematics and natural sciences, measured by the PISA studies, and in English, compared with other countries where English is not the mother tongue
• shall have at least one university among the top twn in Europe, as ranked by Times Higher Education
• shall have an average life expectancy among the ten highest in the world
• shall be among the three most energy-efficient countries in the world and among the three countries that increase their share of renewable energy most in the period
• shall among the best EU members in integrating non-western immigrants and their succesors in the labour market
• shall be a safe country, where the probability of being the victim of crime shall be among the lowest in Europe
• shall have an economy that continues to be among the five strongest in the world, measured by a weighted average of unemployment, public deficit, inflation, stability of prices and balance of payments deficit

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 6 November 2009

Abu Ghraib, Bagram and Guantanamo Bay – three detention centres run by the US military in the past eight years, where prisoners have been tortured in the fight against terrorism.

The media has long played a role in uncovering the excesses of government and military intervention, and media coverage of torture, interrogation processes, special renditions and individual businesses’ involvement does not please the military, the authorities or the companies involved. Indeed, journalists are killed in some countries for trying to cover these topics.

The International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT) and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) held a journalists’ seminar today on ‘Preventing terrorism within the fight against terrorism’.

“There is nothing called ‘objective journalism’,” said Erling Borgen, a journalist who uncovered the Norwegian company Aker Kværner’s involvement until 2004 in supplying materials to Guantanamo Bay. “We all select what we want to say or who we want to speak to.”

Nevertheless, also in investigative reporting, journalists must aim for fair and balanced reports. There is no “nearly truth” or half-truth. The facts have to be right, relevant and essential. The people or companies exposed have the right to replay, even if they refuse to make use of that right.

One of the results of his film, ‘Et lite stykke Norge (A little piece of Norway)’, was a 5 billion Norwegian kroner increase in the Norwegian government’s stake in Kværner.

Prisoner 345, Sami Al Haj, a cameraman for the Al Jazeera TV station, told the Copenhagen Voice how he spent six years in the Guantanamo Bay detention centre, undergoing torture, before he was released in 2008 without being charged. He has since returned to work for Al Jazeera, and has also co-founded the Guantanamo Justice Centre.

Tara McKelvey, contributing editor at Marie Claire magazine and a fellow of Johns Hopkins University’s International Reporting Project, spoke of her book, ‘Monstering: Inside America’s Policy on Secret Interrogations and Torture in the Terror War’ and her perceptions of the public’s response to reports of the torture.

IRCT secretary-general Brita Sydhoff told the Copenhagen Voice that no-one actually knows whether there is more or less torture today than a few years ago, but there is still a need for treatment of torture victims, while prosecuting the perpetrators is a difficult and time-consuming task.

In April 2004, the Abu Ghraib photographs set off an international scandal. Yet until this book, the full story behind that scandal has never been told. Tara McKelvey - the first US journalist to speak with female prisoners from Abu Ghraib - travelled to the Middle East and across the United States to seek out victims and perpetrators.

In her book, McKelvey tells how soldiers, acting in an atmosphere that encouraged abuse and sadism, were unleashed on a prison population of whom the vast majority, according to Army documents, were innocent citizens. She gained unprecedented access to soldiers, officers, administration officials, and suspected terrorists. She also provides an inside look at Justice Department theories of presidential power to show how the many abuses were licensed by the government.

Monstering is a gripping and important exposé that reaches well beyond the frame of the notorious photos to provide a vital examination of the under-investigated crimes of Abu Ghraib.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 27 November 2009

Danish nominee for EU Commissioner Connie Hedegaard has been given the climate action portfolio, while Günter Oettinger gets the energy portfolio and Janez Potocnik was awarded the environment portfolio.

On Tuesday, Hedegaard - previously Denmark’s Climate and Energy Minister - was nominated as EU Commissioner by Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen, who also named her Minister for the UN Climate Conference, to be held in Copenhagen next month.

She was succeeded as Climate and Energy Minister by Lykke Friis.

In a statement on behalf of José Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission, the EU press office said the new Commission must gain approval from the European Parliament before it takes office for a term of office running until 31 October 2014. Commissioners-designate will appear in individual hearings before Parliamentary committees from 11 to 19 January 2010. The vote of consent on the new Commission as a whole is foreseen to take place on 26 January. On the basis of the vote of consent, the Commission shall be appointed by the European Council. Then it can start working.

It will do so on the basis of the political guidelines for the next Commission set out by President Barroso in September last. He highlighted the need for EU leadership, shaping globalisation on the basis of its values and interests. Taking global interdependence as the starting point, he set out a transformational agenda for the EU, a Europe that puts people at the heart of its agenda. He emphasized five key challenges facing Europe:

* Restarting economic growth today and ensuring longñterm sustainability and competitiveness for the future

* Fighting unemployment and reinforcing our social cohesion

* Turning the challenge of a sustainable Europe to our competitive advantage

* Ensuring the security of Europeans

* Reinforcing EU citizenship and participation.

Priorities for tackling these challenges will be set in a ten-year framework to deliver a vision for the EU in 2020, reinvigorating the inclusive social market economy that is the hallmark of the European way of life. The allocation of portfolios has been structured to deliver this ambitious agenda.

In his letters to each Commissioner setting out their new responsibilities, President Barroso has underlined the essential role of the Commission as the motor for the EU’s efforts to address tomorrow’s challenges, as well as the new opportunities provided by the Lisbon Treaty. He repeated his commitment to a smart regulation agenda, respecting subsidiarity and proportionality, focused on clear added value at EU level; paying particular attention to sound financial management; and full respect for the Code of Conduct of the Members of the European Commission. He has also stressed the need for a successful partnership with the Member States and the other institutions, in particular with the European Parliament.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 27 November 2009

Funding of €5 million for R&D and demonstration of a hydrogen refuelling station and fuel cell vehicles in Holstebro has been secured. The LINK2009 project will contribute to the overall efforts of the Scandinavian Hydrogen Highway Partnership of becoming one among the first regions in the world where hydrogen powered cars are marketed. The station and vehicles are expected to be in operation from the year end 2010/2011.

The full financing of €5 million for research, development and demonstration of a 700 bar hydrogen refuelling station and fuel cell vehicles in the city of Holstebro in West Denmark has now been secured.

The project, called LINK2009, will act as the next step for hydrogen for transport in Denmark during 2010, thus contributing to the overall efforts of the Scandinavian Hydrogen Highway Partnership of becoming one among the first regions in the world where hydrogen powered cars are introduced on the market.

The station and vehicles are planned to commence operation around the year end 2010/2011.

The successful West Denmark Project and the recent Copenhagen Project have together secured an additional seven hydrogen stations and 15 fuel cell vehicles in operation in Denmark (out of a total of 12 stations and 23 vehicles in Denmark, covering both road and non-road use).

The first ideas for the LINK2009 project arose during 2008 and first round of funding from the Danish Energy Agency program EUDP was secured in summer 2009. This was also the start of the research and development of the second-generation fuel cell vehicles and hydrogen station, thus pushing the technology further from the first-generation technologies that were developed and tested in the previous projects in Denmark.

In late 2009 the last round of funding for the demonstration of the second-generation technology was secured, also from the Danish EUDP program, totalling the public support to €1.9 million out of a total budget of €5 million, with the remainder provided by companies and vehicle end-users.

In the LINK2009 project, a 700-bar hydrogen refuelling station will be established in the city of Holstebro in West Denmark by year end 2010/2011. Already two hydrogen stations are operated in the city for supply of hydrogen to various non-road fuel cell vehicles. The new 700 bar station will be owned and operated by the local energy company Vestforsyning and hydrogen will be supplied from the existing central electrolysis production plant that the company established in early 2008.

Holstebro municipality will receive three fuel cell vehicles as part of the LINK2009 project and will use these for daily transportation purposes within the municipality departments.

The Danish company H2 Logic will provide fuel cell systems for the vehicles and construct the 700-bar hydrogen station.

As well as being part of the Hydrogen Link Denmark network and contributing to the efforts of the Scandinavian Hydrogen Highway Partnership, LINK2009 is also a continuation of the public-private partnership model that was introduced in previous hydrogen projects in Denmark.

The two main actors in the LINK2009 project, Holstebro municipality and the energy company Vestforsyning, have joined forces in creating the local initiative Climate Circles.

The purpose of Climate Circle is to ensure, coordinate and expand cooperation within the business area of renewable energy in the greater Holstebro area in West Denmark.

The motivations for Climate Circle and partners to support and catalyze the LINK2009 project are clear, says John Sohn, the manager of Climate Circle.

“If we are to move away from fossil fuels in the long term, we have to invest now in developing the alternative solutions,” John Sohn says. “The planned opening of an additional hydrogen station in Holstebro and further fuel cell vehicles shows that the Holstebro area is on the forefront. We don’t expect to become the a centre of gravity for future fuel supply worldwide, instead the potential to produce fuels for transport locally whilst also ensuring business potentials on zero emission transport technologies are sufficient motivation for us.”

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 26 November 2009

President Barack Obama will participate in the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen next month, the White House said yesterday. The US President will table a US emissions reduction target in the range of 17% below 2005 levels in 2020 as part of his goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 83% by 2050.

US President Barack Obama will travel to Copenhagen on 9 December 2009 to participate in COP15, the United Nations Climate Change Conference (UNFCCC), where he is eager to work with the international community to drive progress toward a comprehensive and operational Copenhagen accord.

According to a White House announcement, the President has worked steadily on behalf of a positive outcome in Copenhagen throughout the year.

“Based on the President’s work on climate change over the past 10 months – in the Major Economies Forum, the G20, bilateral discussions and multilateral consultations – and based on progress made in recent, constructive discussions with China and India’s Leaders, the President believes it is possible to reach a meaningful agreement in Copenhagen,” the White House said.

The President’s decision to go is a sign of his continuing commitment and leadership to find a global solution to the global threat of climate change, and to lay the foundation for a new, sustainable and prosperous clean energy future.

The White House also said that, in the context of an overall deal in Copenhagen that includes robust mitigation contributions from China and the other emerging economies, the President is prepared to put on the table a US emissions reduction target in the range of 17% below 2005 levels in 2020 and ultimately in line with final US energy and climate legislation.

“In light of the President’s goal to reduce emissions 83% by 2050, the expected pathway set forth in this pending legislation would entail a 30% reduction below 2005 levels in 2025 and a 42% reduction below 2005 in 2030,” the statement said.

“This provisional target is in line with current legislation in both chambers of Congress and demonstrates a significant contribution to a problem that the US has neglected for too long,” the White House said. “With less than two weeks to go until the beginning of the Copenhagen conference, it is essential that the countries of the world, led by the major economies, do what it takes to produce a strong, operational agreement that will both launch us on a concerted effort to combat climate change and serve as a stepping stone to a legally binding treaty. The President is working closely with Congress to pass energy and climate legislation as soon as possible.”

Obama’s proposals are not ambitious enough, according to John Nordbo, Head of the Climate Change Programme at WWF Verdensnaturfonden, the Danish division of World Wide Fund for Nature. The proposals equate to a cut in greenhouse gas emissions of 4% by 2020 compared with 1990 - the base year used both the UN and the EU.

However, Nordbo told the Danish newspaper Berlingske Tidende that it is more difficult for the US to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 4% compared with 1990 than for Europe to meet its emission reduction targets.

Obama will be stopping over in Copenhagen en route to Oslo, where he will be formally awarded the Nobel Peace Prize the following day.

The US President will attend COP15 at a time when ‘only’ ministers and civil servants will be present, thrashing out the deal that many heads of state and government are expected to sign the following week.

The US Congress is working on climate legislation, but reports indicate that it is unlikely to be adopted before the spring. Clear promises about emissions cut targets from China and India - expected at COP15 - will strengthen the position of the climate-friendly politicians in Congress in their negotiations for a climate law.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 30 November 2009

Hydrogen-fuelled electric cars will help transport VIPs at the climate summit. Are they the future of personal road transport?

They’re very quiet, all they emit when running is water vapour, and some will transport the VIPs attending the UN climate conference, COP15, later this month.

But hydrogen-fuelled electric cars are still at the development stage, they are rather expensive to buy, and Denmark has only a couple of hydrogen filling stations, so running these easily driven vehicles means not straying too far from home.

But because they can be filled up with hydrogen that is separated from water using electricity supplied from wind turbines, they could be the future for personal road transport when fossil fuels are phased out in the coming decade or two.

The New Energy World Industry Grouping (NEW-IG), a non-profit association representing industry in the Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Technology Initiative (FCH JTI), arranged a press trip to Malmö to join a parade of 15 hydrogen fuel cell vehicles to a seminar at the Danish parliament in Copenhagen.

Fifteen cars made by five manufacturers – ranging from Honda’s FCX Clarity over the A and B series from Mercedes-Benz to Fiat’s Panda, Opel’s Hydrogen4 and the Think/H2 Logic Hydrogen – were available for study and test-drives.

The meeting venue in Malmö was a hydrogen filling station that is also frequented by Swedish taxis. Run by the energy utility E.ON, this forms part of the Scandinavian Hydrogen Highway Partnership – also dubbed the Scandinavian hydrogen bridge that will run from Bergen via Stavanger and Oslo to Gothenburg and Malmö to Denmark, and then on to Germany.

As part of its endeavour to make the Scandinavian region one of the first in Europe where hydrogen is commercially available, the partnership aims at having 35 hydrogen stations servicing 100 buses, 500 cars and 500 other speciality vehicles in 2015.

A similar project in Germany, the Clean Energy Partnership (CEP), operates one of the world’s largest demonstration projects for hydrogen technology in Berlin. Vehicles ran over 400,000 km on hydrogen in the first phase of the project – between 2002 and 2008. One of the cars represented here in Denmark, Opel’s HydroGen4, the fourth generation of GM/Opel fuel cell vehicles, has performed well in the German capital.

Between December 2008 and August 2009, ten of Opel’s vehicles drove 50,000 kilometres as part of a test of the vehicles in everyday use.
The carmaker said the fuel cell vehicles have proved that they can match the tough conditions faced in everyday operation, with the test partners reporting that hydrogen can be used as a fuel for everyday use.

In Mantova in Italy’s Lombardia region and in Frankfurt in Germany’s Rhein Main region, Zero Regio is developing and demonstrating zero-emissions transport systems using hydrogen as an alternative fuel. This uses Fiat Pandas and Mercedes-Benz A-series cars.

Alongside its successes, Zero Regio also pointed to some difficulties – including a lack of European regulations for building hydrogen refuelling and distribution facilities, and problems with homologising fuel-cell vehicles in Italy.

Copenhagen environment mayor Klaus Bondam said 75% of CO2 emissions derive from cities and Copenhagen must work to change this. Overall, the municipality of Copenhagen will cut its CO2 emissions by 20% between 2005 and 2015, and should be completely CO2 neutral in 2025. This will be achieved in part by using electric vehicles, both battery driven and fuel-cell driven vehicles.

Having ridden in the Honda Clarity between Malmö and Copenhagen, Bondam noted that electric vehicles would reduce noise and pollution in the city, making living in Copenhagen more enjoyable and cleaner.

However, he said, the 4.83-m long Clarity would not solve the Danish capital’s congestion problems: drivers who need to bring cars into the city should consider the smaller vehicles – such as the Think, which Copenhagen has bought recently.

“All new passenger cars bought by the municipality of Copenhagen will be electrically driven from 2011,” the city’s environment mayor said.

Driving impressions are positive. As a passenger in the sleek Honda Clarity, the only noticeable noise was from the air conditioning compressor. There was little road or wind noise – listen to the interview with the driver for car-related noise. The finish was excellent, and there was no car-induced drive train shudder – which should not exist anyway in an electric car that runs as an automatic. The hydrogen tank, behind and under the rear seat, intrudes on the luggage space, and may reduce this a little compared with similar-sized fossil-fuelled vehicles.

The Opel HydroGen4 was also quiet, but this had an automatic gearbox with ‘drive’ and ‘low’ positions, as well as reverse and ‘park’. Driving this on a route from the parliamentary car part at Christiansborg to Højbro Plads and Kongens Nytorv, past the Black Diamond and the National Museum before returning to the parliamentary car park, I found the car very easy to drive, and it had a very good power take-up – shooting quickly forwards when the accelerator pedal was pushed hard to get past other vehicles at traffic lights. Manoeuvrability for this car – higher and boxier than the Honda, more an MPV – was good, and I quickly felt at home.

However, driving the Opel brought home to me the difficulties road-users have with each other: the car is so quiet that cyclists and pedestrians may not notice it is behind or beside them if they do not keep themselves aware of what is happening about them, so perhaps electric vehicles need some sort of artificial noise source to alert other road-users.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 4 December 2009

One of the effects of climate change is a heightened risk of violent conflict, especially involving poor, badly governed countries with a recent history of armed conflict, the independent peacebuilding organisation International Alert says in a new report. This risk adds to their burdens and makes it harder for them to adapt to climate change. Climate change negotiations focus on the availability and control of finance, rather on the complexities of climate adaptation and the need to harmonise adaptation initiatives with development.

As climate change unfolds, one of its effects is a heightened risk of violent conflict, says the independent peacebuilding organisation International Alert in a new report, ‘Climate change, conflict and fragility – Understanding the linkages, shaping effective responses’.

This risk is at its sharpest in poor, badly governed countries, many of which have a recent history of armed conflict. This both adds to the burdens faced by deprived and vulnerable communities and makes it harder to reduce their vulnerability by adapting to climate change.

According to the organisation, which has worked for over 20 years in areas such as Africa, South Asia, the South Caucasus, Latin America, Lebanon and the Philippines to lay the foundations for lasting peace and security in communities affected by violent conflict, policy discussions about the consequences of climate change are beginning to acknowledge the conflict and security implications.

“However,” International Alert says, “these concerns are not being properly taken on within the complex negotiations for a new international agreement on reducing global warming and responding to climate change. In the negotiating context, the discussion focuses on how much money should be available for it and how that money will be controlled. This discussion pays scant attention to the complexities of adaptation, the need to harmonise it with development, or the dangers of it going astray in fragile and conflict-affected states and thereby failing to reduce vulnerability to climate change.”

Shaping adaptation policies means going beyond the most immediate natural and social effects of climate change and looking to the context in which its impact will be felt, the report states. This is because it is the interaction between the natural consequences and the social and political realities in which people live that will determine whether they can adapt successfully to climate change.

“Doing this means addressing the realities of the system of power in fragile and conflict-affected societies, a structure of power that often systematically excludes the voices of all but a privileged few,” International Alert says. “Policies for adapting to the effects of climate change have to respond to these realities or they will not work. At the same time, the field of development itself will have to adapt in order to face the challenge of climate change. Neither development, adaptation nor peacebuilding can be regarded as a bolt-on to either one of the other two. The problems are interlinked and the policy responses must be integrated.”

In establishing the overall goal of international policy on adaptation as helping people in developing countries adapt successfully to climate change even where there is state fragility or conflict risk, the report makes eight specific policy recommendations:

1. Adaptation to climate change needs to be conflict-sensitive – responding to the needs of the people, involving them in consultation, taking account of power distribution and social order, and avoiding pitting groups against each other.

2. Peacebuilding needs to be climate-proof, ensuring that its progress is not disrupted by the effects of climate change that could and should be anticipated.

3. Shifts towards a low-carbon economy must be supportive of development and peace – unlike what happened with the rapid move to biofuels.

4. Steps must be taken to strengthen poor countries’ social capacity to understand and manage climate and conflict risks.

5. Greater efforts are needed to plan for and cope peacefully with climate-related migration.

6. Institutions responsible for climate change adaptation need to be structured and staffed in a way that reflects the specific challenges of the climate-conflict inter-linkages. For this to be possible, institutions must restructure in such a way as to maximise the participation of ordinary people and build accountable and transparent public institutions.

7. Development policy-making and strategic planning in the future, at both international and national levels, need to integrate with peaceful climate adaptation planning. Compartmentalisation between these areas is no longer viable.

8. A large-scale systematic study of the likely costs of adaptation is required, including the social and political dimensions along with economic sectors that have so far been left out of most estimates.

The consequences of climate change, the incidence of violent conflict and the corrosive effects of state fragility are all major problems, and taking them on together is to take aim at a very difficult target, International Alert says.

“But they must be taken on together because these problems are not isolated from each other,” the organisation says. “At the same time, the fact that they are linked problems helps identify linked solutions that benefit from synergies and that have an impact on several targets at once.”

International Alert says the appropriate overarching goal of international policy on adaptation is to help people in developing countries adapt successfully to climate change even where there is state fragility or conflict risk – which it sums up in the policy goal ‘building resilience’ with the backing of five policy objectives that together constitute a coherent agenda:

1. Adaptation to climate change needs to be conflict-sensitive. In fragile and conflict-affected contexts, all interventions must respond to the needs of the people, involve them in consultation, take account of power distribution and social order, and avoid pitting groups against each other.

2. Peacebuilding needs to be climate-proof. For example, post-conflict reconstruction and the reintegration of ex-combatants into their villages must take account of the long-term viability of the land and natural resources available for lives and jobs.

3. Shifts towards a low-carbon economy must be supportive of development and peace. For example, there must be no repeat of the rapid move to biofuels, which not only reduced food availability, but also threatened to drive millions of people off the land.

4. Steps must be taken to strengthen poor countries’ social capacity to understand and manage climate and conflict risks.

5. Greater efforts are needed to plan for and cope peacefully with climate-related migration.

International Alert says these tasks are feasible – “demanding, certainly, but distinctly achievable.”

Two fundamental shifts are required: in the way institutions are organised, and in the way the climate-conflict inter-linkages are addressed.

First, the peacebuilding organisations ays, institutions responsible for climate change adaptation – whether under the architecture of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), international financial institutions, development agencies or peacebuilding organisations – “need to ensure that their internal systems and structures promote adaptation even where there is state fragility or conflict risk. In these complex and delicate situations, adaptation must do no harm, and ideally help the goal of peace along its way. For this to be possible, institutions must restructure in such a way as to maximise the participation of ordinary people and build accountable and transparent public institutions.”

Second, International Alert says, “strategies must adapt to meet the combined challenge of climate change, conflict risk and state fragility. It is wrong to imply that henceforth there will be old-style development with adaptation on top. It may be that there will be a continuum from development activities that are not affected by climate change to development activities whose entire purpose is adaptation, but overall policy and strategy will present a new form of development. That means development assistance will need to adapt too.”

According to the report, a crucial step towards these objectives and the appropriate modes of implementation is a large-scale systematic study of adaptation costs.

Current estimates of the costs vary widely and are reportedly so short of the mark that they will not very helpful to planners, International Alert says.

It adds that these estimates “ignore costs of climate change impacts against which adaptation – as presently conceived – cannot protect people, such as those that stem from elite resource capture and discriminatory regulations on land rights. A comprehensive and holistic assessment and costing of adaptation is a priority if we are to have any hope that climate change adaptation can reduce the risk of conflict and fragility.”

Whether the new form of development is (or can be permitted to be) more expensive than the outlay to which donors are already committed has yet to be calculated, the organisation says.

“But it seems likely that much and probably most expenditure on adaptation will simply be indistinguishable from expenditure on development because the activities will be fused,” it adds. “It is in the context of this challenging agenda and these practical considerations that the next steps on an uncertain road need to be designed.”

The report, prepared by International Alert and the Initiative for Peacebuilding - Early Warning (IfP-EW), is based on a research paper that was originally commissioned by the UK Department for International Development.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 7 December 2009

The International Energy Agency expects CO2 emissions from transport to double between 2000 and 2050. But a new study from Japan’s Institution for Transport Policy Studies shows that expanding public transport systems and the introduction of environmentally friendly vehicles keep emissions in 2050 at the 2000 level.

A report issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2004 says the transport sector accounts for 23% of the overall emissions of energy derived greenhouse gases. Emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) from land-based transport are increasing at the second-highest pace, exceeded only by emissions from electricity generation.

On a country-by-country basis, CO2 emissions derived from transport have grown consistently around the world except in Japan and several developed countries in the European Union (EU). Indeed, the International Energy Agency (IEA) expects CO2 emissions from transport to double between 2000 and 2050.

But a new study from Japan’s Institution for Transport Policy Studies (ITPS) shows that aggressive introduction of environmentally friendly vehicles running on batteries or fuel cells, or powered by hybrid technologies, and a change of transport mode to an expanded and improved public transport systems will keep emissions at the 2000 level in 2050.

ITPS believes that three reduction recommendations will help to curb CO2 emissions considerably: measures to sharply increase the use of public transport; measures to make electric vehicles the mainstay vehicles in urban areas; and measures to help developing countries finance the construction of new railways.

The institution proposes that metropolises around the world over the next 40 years develop their public transport systems to equal the share public transport has in Tokyo: here, buses and railways account for more than 60% of overall urban-area transport.

Not only does public transport have very low CO2 emissions per passenger, ITPS says it is also effective in easing traffic congestion in urban areas, especially in developing countries, where the traffic volume is expected to grow in the future.

High-speed railways between cities will have a strong impact on a change from road vehicles but also from aircraft, the institution says. While it is not easy to justify the high construction costs of high-speed inter-city railways, ITPS believes that aggressively promoting their introduction from the perspective of mitigating global warming is the route to take.

It will also be necessary to make public transport more attractive while reducing the attractiveness of other modes of transport, the institution says.

“To make public transport more attractive it will be effective in developed countries to create an environment that enables passengers to perform their business tasks, with built-in wifi and power sources, and with easy access to stations,” the transport institution says. “In addition, restricting the ownership and use of vehicles through the imposition of taxes and regulations will be important for promoting the use of public transport.”

Such restrictions would also help promote the use of electric vehicles.

ITPS acknowledges, however, that transport needs are not being fully satisfied in many developing countries in the first place, so introducing measures to restrict the use of vehicles must be carefully considered.

The transport institution wants environmentally friendly vehicles to have 80% share of all passenger cars in 2050 in urban areas. Insufficient battery performance will mean electrical vehicles will remain unsuitable for long-distance driving even in 2050, which would be an incentive for changing to public transport for inter-city transport.

Developing countries should introduce small electric vehicles with a necessary minimum performance to replace conventional vehicles, allowing these countries to leap-frog motorisation. Securing the supply of electricity to charge these vehicles’ batteries is vital.

Developing countries face an expensive task of building new railways to meet the transport needs deriving from the adoption of these policies.

“We estimate that if the above-mentioned policy measures are adopted, it will become necessary to build at least 690,000 km of new railways in developing countries, with costs totalling $8.6 trillion,” ITPS says.

While it is difficult for developing countries to make such huge investments, ITPS proposes a finance mechanism in which developed countries support railway construction.

“We have in mind the official development assistance, an existing means to support economic development,” the transport institution says. “If developed countries are to cover half the cost of building railway infrastructure in India and other developing countries, apart from China, which has it own plans, the cost for the developed countries would amount to an estimated $2.5 trillion. It is worth noting that this figure is far smaller than the amount of support funds committed by the developed countries in development aid projects, which is 0.7% of gross national income.”

Over the next 40 years, this would total $16.5 trillion, ITPS says.

Various technologies must also be transferred to developing countries with the aim of improving the environment, the institution says. But doing this means solving patent-related problems, providing training so workers in developing countries can use and maintain equipment, and transferring policy expertise to developing countries and local authorities.

The Copenhagen Voice spoke with Yuki Tanaka, the director of international affairs at Japan’s Institution for Transport Policy Studies, about the institution’s report and recommendations for moving towards a low-carbon transport system.

David Banister, professor of transport studies at the University of Oxford, discussed broader aspects of moving to a low-carbon transport system with the Copenhagen Voice.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, 12 December 2009

In warfare, a guerilla pops up in expected places, attacks the opposition and then disappears into the local background, where he or she blends in totally. In Silver.Spoon.Dining, Tiffany Ng’s guerilla dining concept, an ethereal restaurant appears for an evening or three, then disappears after leaving a good impression the palate.

Half-way through the COP15 climate summit in Copenhagen, Cafe Fokus on Frederiksborggade was the venue for a single evening of Silver.Spoon.Dining.

As well as a selection of classic Cafe Fokus dishes (Caesar salad, goat cheese salad, burger and beef tenderloin), diners on 12 December could choose from a CO2 minimal menu offering onion soup with licorice and fennel; scallops on a stick, with carrot confit cream and beetroot chips; oven-baked pork belly, with cauliflower cream and vanilla, and apple juice foam; Calvados and apple must salted salmon, with watercress and apple salad; and licorice marinated venison, with fennel comfit.

Judging by the selection served to us – we did not have the venison – chef Fabian Moraga had composed an appetizing and delicious menu from locally produced food that fused the French cuisine with the Scandinavian.

According to the description in the menu, Silver.Spoon.Dining is a new venture where chefs, menus, venues and themes come together for a single event in an ethereal restaurant, before disbanding and then reappearing elsewhere.

“We strive to satisfy your epicurean tastes by allowing up-and-coming chefs the creative freedom to design innovative menus using the freshest, most-sustainable ingredients available,” the menu blurb says. “Quality dining for affordable prices at its best.”

That the food was not boring must be due to Tiffany’s concept and Moraga’s work.

Originally from Chile, Moraga has been a chef for more than a decade, perfecting his culinary skills in Copenhagen, Norrköping, Malmö and Stockholm.

He finds transforming a simple commodity into edible artwork exciting and invigorating. Moraga believes it is the responsibility of the chef to know the history of each of his dishes , from feed and fertilizer to harvest and transport. Therefore he relies primarily on local, sustainable suppliers, selecting the ingredients with the utmost care.

Good and appealing food with low carbon footprint ought to have drawn in the crowds from the Bella Center. But the restaurant was only half-full – perhaps the government officials and the NGO representatives had decided instead to go to Helsingør for the big food bash at the Kronborg castle arranged by the weekly magazine Monday Morning.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 18 September 2009 - reporting from an environment workshop hosted in Gdansk, Poland, by Media21 and the Finnish Institute of International Affairs

Phosphorus, nitrogen and geography have been slowly strangling the Baltic Sea, but today’s water samples taken by biologists at Hel were good. Are the many efforts to save the Baltic Sea working?

The white disc on the knotted rope was visible down to a depth of four or five meters in the Hel Bay, a stretch of the Baltic Sea off the Polish city of Gdansk. The water temperature was about 16˚C and the salinity was 6‰.

“These are good figures,” says one of the researchers taking the measurements. “Elsewhere in the Baltic they’re worse. Much worse.”

Discussing measurement results. Video: Michael de Laine.

Dead zones with blue-green algae and an almost total lack of oxygen cover more than ten percent of sea bed of the Baltic Sea - at 377,000 km² the largest inland sea in the European Union. These zones are result of a conspiracy between the sea’s geographical circumstances and years of pollution.

In the words of another researcher, the Baltic Sea is a P-soup. Although this is a reference to pea-soupers, dense fogs deriving from coal fires that clogged Britain’s air for a century from the mid-1880s until eradicated by successive clean air laws, the ‘P’ stands for phosphorus.

Phosphorus is necessary for humans and plants to grow. Together with nitrogen it is an ingredient in the fertilizers used in farming. Over-use of fertilizers means nitrogen and phosphorus are washed by the rain into the rivers flowing into Baltic Sea.

But the phosphorus gets algae to grow in the water, devouring oxygen; some of the algae drop to the bottom and use the remaining oxygen, and release sulphurous substances as they decompose. Fish swim away from the areas that are low in oxygen, while the algae form an algae bloom that is washed around by the current, sometimes landing on the coasts and beaches.

The beaches at Hel - clearly a holiday resort and the home of a small fishing fleet - have been cleaned up, but it was beaches on the Finnish and Swedish coasts that took the brunt of the effects of the pollution. Those two countries have led the fight to clean up the Baltic Sea.

In reality, cleaning up the Baltic Sea has meant reducing nitrogen, phosphorus, heavy metals and other pollutants in waste water and rivers, mainly running from Poland and Russia to the Baltic Sea, and cutting down on emissions to the water environment of the many industries in the region, including the paper makers, which are intensive users of water.

The Baltic Sea has long been polluted almost to the point of asphyxiation. With flows of water restricted by the Skagerrak, the Kattegat, the Great Belt and Little Belt, and the Sound – waters shared by Norway, Sweden and Denmark, but used as international waterways – and receiving pollution from industry, including paper making, farming and shipping, the Baltic Sea is eutrophic.

This means that it suffers from chemical nutrients that increase the primary productivity of the ecosystem, but lead to negative environmental effects such as anoxia (decrease in oxygen levels) and severe reductions in water quality, fish, and other animal populations.

Cleaning the Baltic Sea and its associated waters, and keeping them free from pollution, is a challenge that needs much work by and close collaboration among the ten nations directly involved – the other nations are Finland, Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Germany.

Of the countries mentioned, Norway does not border on the Baltic Sea – but it is in the Baltic Sea’s drainage basin, together with Belarus, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Ukraine. Together the countries form a catchment area that is home to 85 million people.

Daniel Conley, an oceanographer and holder of the Marie Curie Chair at Lund University’s GeoBiosphere Science Centre, describes the Baltic Sea’s condition as hypoxic. The surface area of the Baltic is about 37,000 km², and as much as 11% of the total area of the sea lacks oxygen, having less than 2 mg of oxygen in every litre of water. Because of pollution – primarily untreated waste water and seepage of chemicals from agricultural fertilizers – the freshwater is rich in nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus.

While fish can swim away from this, smaller organisms such as algae and zoo plankton, part of the diet chain of the fish in the Baltic Sea, die and decompose on the sea bottom with the aid of sulphurous bacteria. This process consumes more oxygen and forms a dead zone.

Daniel Conley, oceanographer - 1. Video: Michael de Laine.

The stratification in the Baltic Sea caused by the salt water inflow and freshwater outflow traps material such as pollution and algae for longer periods than in other seas.

The salt water inflow brings vital oxygen, which starts to mix with the bottom layers of water in the Baltic Sea, but the frequency of the massive inflows of oxygen-rich salty water appears to have fallen from once every five years to once every ten, although the volume is little changed.

The situation is not new – Conley says sediment cores show that hypoxia has occurred several times in the 8,000 years that the Baltic Sea has existed – and is partly a result of the inflow of salty water from the North Sea underlying the freshwater that derives from a number of Europe’s rivers, including the Neva, which is the largest source of freshwater for the Baltic Sea.

Conley points to several factors that may determine observed hypoxia cycles. They include the explosion of agriculture following the development 500 years ago of a plough that can turn the soil over; the felling of forests that bind carbon and nitrogen in the soil; and the development of pig farms – each pig produces 2.5 times the amount of waste as a human.

Engineering-type solutions to the problem have yet to be found in Conley’s opinion. Releasing oxygen into the deeper parts of the Baltic is not feasible, he says. Increasing the water exchange across the Drogden Sill, in the Sound off Copenhagen, would increase the salt water inflow – but also create more stratification and more hypoxia. Closing the Drogden Sill would lead to short-term hypoxia over 10-15 years, but improved oxygen conditions after about 30 years.

Conley believes the only engineering solution that would improve the conditions in the Baltic Sea is halocline ventilation through mixing the salty and fresh water at depths of 50 to 125 m, although its environmental consequences are unknown (a halocline is a strong, vertical salinity gradient). Structures resembling wind turbines could be used for water mixing.

Warning that there is no ’silver bullet’ that will provide a solution, Conley asks whether we can enhance the permanent burial of phosphorus in the Baltic Sea sediments; whether we should manipulate species to change the biological interaction in the Baltic; or whether we ought to reduce the number of mid-level fish (sprat and herring) to allow lower organisms to eat the algae.

Conley’s own proposal is to restore the coastal regions’ function as a filter to reduce nutrient loading of the Baltic Sea. He says nutrients are processed in the coastal zone and “every time you disturb the soil, nutrients are released”.

Funding for solutions should concentrate on reducing nutrients released by agriculture and waste water treatment plants, while creating more forests around rivers and nutrient hot-spots would lead to less nutrient run-off from farms as the trees would bind nutrients.

But, Conley says, while you may increase the freshwater inflow into the Baltic Sea, you cannot go back to a pristine condition there.

Daniel Conley, oceanographer - 2. Video: Michael de Laine.

The Baltic Sea flows out through the Danish straits - the Great and Little Belts and the Sound; however, the flow of water through and the mixing of salt and fresh water in the Baltic are complex.

A surface layer of brackish water discharges 940 km³ per year into the North Sea. Due to the difference in salinity, a sub-surface layer of more saline water moving in the opposite direction brings in 475 km³ per year. It mixes very slowly with the upper waters, resulting in a salinity gradient from top to bottom, with most of the salt water remaining below 40-70 m. The general circulation is counter-clockwise: northwards along its eastern boundary, and south along the western one.

The difference between water outflow and inflow comes entirely from fresh water. More than 250 rivers and streams drain a basin of about 1.6 million km², contributing a volume of 660 km³ per year to the Baltic Sea. They include the major rivers of north Europe, such as the Oder, the Vistula, the Neman, the Daugava and the Neva. Additional fresh water comes from the difference of precipitation less evaporation, which is positive.

Infrequent inflows of North Sea water are an important source of salty water and also transport oxygen into the depths of the Baltic Sea. Such inflows occurred on average every four to five years until the 1980s. In recent decades, however, they have become less frequent, with the three latest in 1983, 1993 and 2003, suggesting a new inter-inflow period of about ten years.

The flow of fresh water from the rivers and the flow of salty water from the southwest build up a gradient of salinity in the Baltic Sea. The salinity gradient is paralleled by a temperature gradient. These two factors limit many species of animals and plants to a relatively narrow region of Baltic Sea. The most saline water is vertically stratified in the water column to the north, creating a barrier to the exchange of oxygen and nutrients, and fostering completely separate maritime environments.

Because of the abundant freshwater supply, the Baltic Sea’s salinity is much lower than that of ocean water (which averages 3.5%, or 35‰). The open surface waters of the central basin have salinity of 6-8‰. At the semi-enclosed bays with major freshwater inflows, such as head of Finnish Gulf with the mouth of the Neva River and the head of the Gulf of Bothnia with the mouths of the Lule, Tornio and Kemi Rivers, the salinity is considerably lower. Below 40-70 m, the salinity is 10-15‰ in the open Baltic Sea, and more than this near the Danish straits.

Some estimates say that about 100,000 km² of the Baltic’s sea floor (a quarter of its total area) is a variable dead zone. The saltier (and therefore denser) water remains on the bottom, isolating it from surface waters and the atmosphere. This leads to decreased oxygen concentrations within the zone. It is mainly bacteria that grow here, digesting organic material and releasing hydrogen sulphide. Because of this large zone that lacks oxygen, the sea floor ecology differs from that of the neighbouring Atlantic Ocean.

Andzrej Tonderski of the Pomeranian Centre for Environmental Research & Technology (POMCERT) in Gdansk calls the Baltic Sea a P-soup – where ‘P’ stands for phosphorus. The phosphorus in the water leads to algae bloom, and eventually results in the severe or total depletion of oxygen that characterises the Baltic Sea.

But mankind cannot live without that phosphorus, Tonderski points out: it helps us grow.

“Modern agriculture depends on phosphorus derived from phosphate rock, a non-renewable resource,” he says. “The global reserves of phosphate rock may be depleted in 50 to 100 years. It will become a strategic resource in about 30 years – and several countries, including the USA, have restricted exports of the material.”

Tonderski adds that there is a need for a phosphorus action plan for the Baltic Sea region – what he calls ‘common pot’ funding for effective initiatives in critical areas of activity, such as recovering phosphorus from sludge from waste water treatment plants, to eke out supplies of phosphorus.

Andzrej Tonderski, POMCERT. Video: Michael de Laine.

Agreeing that the Baltic Sea is one of the most polluted water regions of the world, Lennart Gladh of WWF Sweden says that the Baltic Sea’s catchment area is about 4.5 times larger than the sea itself. Consequently, the problems must be solved on land. And cutting the pollution coming from point sources such as industry and waste water treatment plants puts a greater burden on farming, where the sources of pollution are more diffuse.

Concentration of nitrogen in the waters of the Baltic Sea has risen eightfold and concentration of phosphorus has risen fourfold in the past century, he says. Farming is responsible for 40% of the nitrogen and 50% of the phosphorus in the Baltic Sea, while transport and energy together are responsible for another 40% of the nitrogen.

Keeping to its slogan ‘for a living plant’, WWF says farming should not be subsidised for providing products that have a market, such as cereals, milk and meat. Such money should instead go towards paying for ‘public goods’ such as water protection, biodiversity, climate initiatives, cultural heritage and rural development.

“Of the European Union’s budget, 43% is in the form of farming subsidies under the common agricultural policy,” Gladh says. He would rather see regional common agricultural policies that are adapted to variations in natural conditions and local problems. A water framework directive and landscape and freshwater restoration efforts should also form a part of EU policies.

On the whole, Gladh believes, the polluter should pay.

His colleague at WWF Finland, Anita Mäkinen, says the Baltic Sea is still threatened despite a number of agreements aimed at throwing light on and rectifying its problems.

WWF has issued a Baltic eco-region programme that calls on a reform of the EU’s common agricultural policy to turn it into a common environment and rural policy. Mäkinen says this would supply the environmental goods and services demanded by European citizens and taxpayers, provide a more transparent, equitable and efficient support system for rural areas, and facilitate more market-oriented and less trade-distorting farming.

“A Baltic Sea region strategy could help us achieve a more integrated approach to managing the Baltic,” she says.

Lennart Gladh, WWF Sweden. Video: Michael de Laine.

In the eyes of Sindre Langaas, “The role of agriculture is often simplified in environmental issues.”

The only farming representative who agreed to attend the workshop, Langaas comes from the Federation of Swedish Farmers, LRF.

He agrees that agriculture has a responsibility for polluting the Baltic Sea – 60% of waterborne nitrogen and 50% of waterborne phosphorus flowing into the Baltic come from farming and managed forestry. But he points out that a number of the determining factors in farming are natural, not man-made; these include soil properties, temperature, and precipitation.

On the other hand, the crops grown, the area of land cultivated and the number and types of animals raised depend on market conditions. Agri-environmental measures such as requirements to manure storage and handling, and agricultural practices in general also impact on farmers’ work.

Langaas says farmers are acting to reduce emissions. They plant catch crops such as grain after they have harvested the main crops; the catch crops keep nitrogen and minerals in the soil. Farmers have introduced riparian buffer zones between their land and a river or stream to conserve the soil, and they have created or restored wetlands both as a buffer and in the interests of biodiversity.

Farmers also apply liquid manure directly into the topsoil to help reduce leakage, and manure storage occurs in tanks covered with lids or membranes to prevent evaporation.

Some have bought a measuring system that determines the optimal amount of nutrients needed for a crop – a quite expensive system that they rent out to other farmers.

“Finland and Sweden spend considerable amounts on the environment in agriculture,” Langaas says. “But Denmark and Germany have higher nitrogen leakage.”

Sindre Langaas, Federation of Swedish Farmers. Video: Michael de Laine.

As a source of funding for sustainable growth project, the Nordic Investment Bank (NIB) focuses on four areas: transport, logistics and communications; innovation; energy; and the environment.

For the past ten years or so, NIB has helped finance four projects covered by a large investment programme in St Petersburg. These aim at reconstructing and upgrading two of the Russian city’s major waste water treatment plants and a sewage collection system. St Petersburg will be able to treat 94% of its waste water from 2010, up from the present level of 85%.

Until the second half of the 20th century, the city did not treat its waste water, and even now some 300,000 m³ of municipal and industrial waste water is discharged into the Neva River every day without treatment. A project to treat 296,425 m³ of this will cut phosphorus pollution by 1,058 t a year, nitrogen pollution by 3,262 t a year and the biological-oxygen demand (BOD, the oxygen used by microorganisms to decompose organic waste in water) by 12,027 t a year.

Another project funding source is the Nordic Environment Finance Corporation (NEFCO), which has a geographic mandate limited to Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, but following the Baltic states’ admission to the EU the focus is growing on Russia (the most important area), Ukraine and Belarus.

“It is cheaper to reduce discharges in these countries than in the Nordic countries,” says NEFCO’s Mikael Sjövall. NEFCO-funded projects have reduced phosphorus discharges by 1,000 t a year in waste water treatment plants, and there is growing focus is on cutting nitrogen and BODs.

NEFCO has €353 million available for project funding, but only a maximum of €5 million is available for each project, so project managers must find sources of co-funding. NEFCO issues loans and capital investments for environmental issues, climate issues, protecting the Baltic Sea, and mitigation of toxic discharges. The projects must rely on tested technologies and the emissions reductions must be targeted and measurable. No projects on greenfield sites are funded because there are no emissions cuts resulting from them.

The finance corporation and the European Union have funded a pilot study of waste water treatment in Kaliningrad - there are many potential investments at the 20 communities covered by the study. They currently emit 160 t of phosphorus and 700 t of nitrogen as they lack modern waste water treatment.

“Currently, 217 municipal waste water treatment plants discharge directly into the Baltic Sea and rivers flowing to the Baltic without reducing nitrogen and phosphorus to acceptable levels,” Sjövall says. “This includes about a half of Warsaw’s waste water.”

Mikael Sjövall, NEFCO. Video: Michael de Laine.

Poland is in the process of modernising or building waste water treatment plants to cut emissions of nitrogen and phosphorus to the Baltic Sea.

Olgried Gelbewicz of Waterworks Poland says a scheme to improve waste water treatment at Szczecin, about 350 km west of Gdansk, will cut nitrogen flowing into the Baltic Sea from 1,800 t in 2000 to 200 t in 2010; phosphorus emissions will be cut from 240 t in 2000 to 20 t in 2010, he says.

In Gdansk itself, work is also progressing to modernise one waste water treatment plant, which processes 87% of Gdansk’s sewage, to cut nitrogen and phosphorus emissions. Similar work is in progress at St Petersburg.

Karri Eloheimo of Finland’s John Nurminen Foundation agrees that treating waste water to cut nitrogen and phosphorus emissions is important as the biggest point sources of phosphorous entering the Baltic Sea are the municipal waste water treatment plants of big cities.

According to the foundation, the Baltic Sea has been used for many years as a dump for uncleansed community water, waste water from industries, agriculture and ship traffic, and different kinds of solid refuse.

The bottom sediments of the Baltic Sea still contain large volumes of heavy metals and other environmental toxins. Since the 1990s, the amount of toxins and heavy metals in the fish population of the Baltic Sea decreased, but the concentrations still remain very high.

Eutrophication is the biggest problem of the Baltic Sea, and the Gulf of Finland is its most eutrophicated basin. Though eutrophying nutrient discharges have lately decreased, there has been an increase in the visible symptoms of eutrophication, such as blue-green algae, water opacity, beach mucilage and the number of anoxic seafloor areas. According to current estimates, climate change will further precipitate the eutrophication of the Baltic Sea.

The current phosphorous load to the Baltic Sea from land-based sources is about 30,000 t a year. The Gulf of Finland is one of the most heavily loaded areas of the Baltic Sea, as it represents only 10% of the total volume of the Baltic, but still receives over 7,000 t of phosphorous annually. The annual reduction target in the Helsinki Commission’s Baltic Sea Action Plan is 15,000 t. This reduction target has been shared into quotas for each country, based on their emissions of phosphorous and nitrogen to the Baltic Sea. The annual phosphorous reduction target of Finland is 150 t.

Sources of phosphorous entering the Baltic Sea can be divided to diffuse and point sources. Diffuse sources (mainly from agriculture) contribute over 50% of total phosphorus inputs. The biggest point sources are municipal wastewaters of big cities.

“The aim of our Clean Baltic Sea project is to use cost-efficient measures, focused areas and cross-border collaboration to cut 2,500 t of phosphorus from point sources in all Baltic Sea countries to achieve 0.5 mg of phosphorus in every litre of purified water,” says the John Nurminen Foundation’s Eloheimo. “We will reduce phosphorus emissions to the Baltic Sea from St Petersburg’s waste water treatment plants from 2,200 t a year in 2004 to 500 t a year in 2015.”

Kaliningrad, Ukraine and Belarus are also to reduce their emissions

“About 40% of the phosphorus entering the Baltic Sea comes from Poland,” Eloheimo adds. “The Helsinki Commission, the governing body of the Helsinki Convention, has an 8,000 t a year target cut for Poland’s phosphorus emissions, but there are problems.”

The intention is that 40 Polish cities should be working together in this emissions-cutting project, but the collaboration currently involves only two cities. Poland expects to have finished building or modernising 1,000 waste water treatment plants in 2013. The Krakow waste water treatment plant is aiming for a maximum of 0.3 mg phosphorus in each litre of water. Greatest focus is on waste water treatment plants serving cities of 100,000 people or more.

“It will be interesting to see what the waste water treatment situation will really be like in Poland when this construction project is finished,” Eloheimo adds.

Maciej Lorek, the director of Gdansk’s Environmental Department, says the biggest problems regarding the future of the Baltic Sea are publicity and awareness.

Politicians do not think that coordination of policies - between countries, or application areas such as land-sea - is important. And Polish people have a distrust of politicians.

Poland is the largest emitter of nitrogen and phosphorus to the Baltic Sea, and is responsible for 34% of the nitrogen and 32% of the phosphorus emissions. The phosphorus and nitrogen load in the rivers is higher than the effluent entering the waste water treatment plants. But, he says, measured per capita, Poland has low nitrogen and phosphorus emissions. Poland’s emissions are falling, while Germany’s are static and Sweden’s seem to be rising.

“Farming should be dealt with first as agriculture’s emissions are high but more difficult to control,” Lorek says. Poland has quite high use of phosphorus in farming, 18 kg/ha, but nitrogen use is 50 kg/ha on average.

Lorek recommends closer collaboration across the whole of the Baltic Sea catchment area. There should be greater efforts to locate financing possibilities and the money should be used on programmes to reduce waste in the Baltic.

He feels there should be a Baltic Sea authority to administer funding as a single source of project finance. It should also oversee the projects.

“The pollution of the Baltic Sea is primarily a social problem,” says Markku Ollikainen, a professor environmental and research economics at the University of Helsinki’s Department of Economics and Management. “The Baltic Sea is a valuable source of human well-being. As such it is a common property resource, but there is no supra-national body to regulate how the countries of the Baltic region treat the sea. And the non-simultaneous nature of social development in these countries has strengthened the asymmetry.”

He says the nature and roots of the problem are not properly understood.

“The counter-clockwise flow of water in the Baltic Sea is noteworthy,” Ollikainen says. “The pollution, from Poland and Russia, is transferred by the sea currents to other countries, primarily Finland and Sweden – but the polluters do not see eutrophication as a problem.”

The polluting countries are poor, while the countries that suffer from the pollution are richer. Yet the poorer countries pay the most and the rich countries reap the benefits.

Ollikainen sees a need for a binding international agreement for the Baltic Sea region.

“More policies are not enough,” he says. “The agreement must be fair and cost-efficient. Those benefiting from the clean up must pay more, and there are different ways of doing this. Nevertheless, costs must be minimised to avoid wasting resources.”

In this respect, Ollikainen says, the Helsinki Commission’s Baltic Sea Action Plan is “good, expensive and unfair”.

Claiming that a lack of political willingness leads to ineffective environment policies, Ollikainen notes that lack of political action is due to several factors – a fear of voters’ reactions, no feeling of ‘ownership’ of the problem, and a readiness to put the blame on other countries.

“Protecting the Baltic Sea requires publicity, democracy and civilian institutes that do not have a negative attitude to environmental movements,” he says.

Farming run-offs must be reduced, Ollikainen says. The EU’s common agricultural policy has no special focus on water protection, while farmers’ revenues from the policy help increase the area under cultivation unnecessarily.

Biodiversity preservation requires creative solutions and climate change will modify the Baltic Sea’s ecosystem. Ollikainen proposes that a nutrient trading system be adopted for nitrogen and phosphorus emissions.

“Effective and integrated administrative practices must be established for protecting the whole of the Baltic Sea,” Ollikainen says, “and they must include all sectors.”

In addition, the risks and loads of marine traffic, especially oil transports, must be controlled, in part to avoid oil spillage.

Markku Ollikainen, University of Helsinki. Video: Michael de Laine.

The Baltic Sea’s pollution problem has been the centre of regional environmental agreements since the mid-1970s, with the Helsinki Convention at the forefront.

In 1974, for the first time ever, all the sources of pollution around an entire sea were made subject to a single convention that was signed by the then seven Baltic Sea coastal states. This 1974 Helsinki Convention entered into force on 3 May 1980.

In the light of political changes and developments in international environmental and maritime law, a new convention was signed in 1992 by all the states bordering on the Baltic Sea, and by the European Community. After ratification the new Helsinki Convention, the Convention on the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Baltic Sea Area, 1992, entered into force on 17 January 2000.

This convention covers the whole of the Baltic Sea area, including inland waters and the water of the sea itself, as well as the seabed. Measures are also taken to reduce land-based pollution in the whole catchment area of the Baltic Sea.

The governing body of the convention is the Helsinki Commission, also known as Helcom, or Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission. The present contracting parties are Denmark, Estonia, the EU, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia and Sweden.

Minna Pyhälä says Helcom is an environmental policy-maker that coordinates the regional protection activities, but has no mandate for fisheries, farming or shipping under the International Maritime Organization, which includes pollution deriving from shipping. It tries to ensure that the Helsinki Convention recommendations are implemented, but they are not legally binding on the convention’s signatories.

The region’s environment ministers agreed in 1988 to cut nitrogen and phosphorus emissions by 50%, and a joint plan to reduce phosphorus emissions to the Baltic Sea was launched in 1992.

Helcom also developed a Baltic Sea Action Plan, launched in 2007, which aims at reversing the degradation of the sea by 2021. A new assessment of the state of the Baltic Sea, from April 2009, indicates that eutrophication is a widespread problem in the sea.

Reaching a ‘clear water’ state in the Baltic Sea requires a 42% cut in phosphorus input and an 18% cut in nitrogen input to the sea, but with regional differences to take account of the state of the sea - some areas such as the Gulf Finland are not as badly hit as other areas. National implementation plans are in place to reach provisional reduction goals by 2010.

“For political reasons, acquiring, agreeing on and adopting the various measurement figures for assessments and monitoring are difficult,” Pyhälä says.

Minna Pyhälä, Helsinki Commission (Helcom). Video: Michael de Laine.

Emilia Mustonen, Baltic Sea Action Group. Video: Michael de Laine.

As we leave Hel by train for the 2½-hour journey back to Gdansk, we learn that EU leaders meeting in Stockholm had discussed the European Union’s Baltic Sea strategy. The Swedish EU Presidency confirmed that the EU heads of state and government are expected to adopt the strategy at the end of October.

This strategy indicates that rapid action is needed to clean up the Baltic Sea, says Jari Luoto, the ambassador for Baltic Sea issues at the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He notes that there are economic challenges facing the strategy at the moment - recession, differences in development among the countries in the catchment area. In addition, he says, the EU strategy needs an external dimension and there is a lack of cooperation between the various authorities.

Jari Luoto, ambassador for Baltic Sea issues at the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Video: Michael de Laine.

“The environmental objective ranks as a high priority based on the urgency of addressing the ecological and environmental decline of the Baltic Sea in particular,” said the working group that prepared the action plan for the Baltic Sea strategy. “Whilst the development of the EU strategy for the Baltic Sea region also needs to address environmental concerns in land areas, the priority given to the marine environment reflects the 2007 European Council conclusions, highlighting that the strategy for the Baltic Sea region must address the urgent environmental challenges related to the Baltic Sea.

“Fulfilment of this objective will also secure the full economic potential of the goods and services provided by the marine ecosystem, thereby improving the well-being and health of people living in the region, and in line with the overall objectives of the Integrated Maritime Policy. The action plan introduces the notion of interdependence of countries in the Baltic Sea region in the field of environment, especially with regard to the pollution of the Baltic Sea.”

Because it is out of season, the ferry boat between Hel and Gdansk, which takes 110 minutes to navigate the 16 km stretch of water, sails only once a day. But other shipping, especially of oil and gas, is increasing. Russian ports are seeing growth, with rising oil transports from Primorsk (80 million t in 2007) and Ust Luga, and more growth to come. This is resulting in growing emissions from shipping, primarily sulphur oxides (SOx) and nitrogen oxides (NOx).

Shipping on the Baltic Sea is becoming more frequent, and the risks related to oil damage are increasing as well. Minor cases of oil damage occur on the Baltic Sea each year, but major oil catastrophes have so far been avoided. The size of oil tankers in the Baltic Sea traffic increases on a continuous basis. In order to prevent large-scale oil disasters, it is essential to invest in maritime safety and to improve the oil destruction readiness in case of damage, says the John Nurminen Foundation.

The public has little knowledge of that debate, and the debate has hardly started about the effects on the Baltic Sea of the construction from next year of the planned 1,220-km Nord Stream gas pipeline.

Is Europe’s increasing dependency on Russian oil and gas going to overshadow the need for a massive Baltic Sea clean-up? Or will the broader climate change mitigation efforts leave the clean-up of the Baltic Sea as an under-financed second priority?

Click here to read the WWF Baltic Ecoregion Programme.

Click here to go to NEFCO’s website

Click here to visit the Nordic Investment Bank website

Click here to go to the Baltic Sea Action Group website

Click here for more information about the Baltic Sea Action Summit

Click here to go to the Helcom website

Click here to visit Lund University’s GeoBiosphere Science Centre website.

Click here to go to the website of POMCERT - Pomeranian Centre for Environmental Research and Technology.

Click here to visit the website of the Federation of Swedish Farmers (LRF).

Click here to go to the John Nurminen Foundation website.

Click here to visit the University of Helsinki, Department of Economics and Management website.

Click here to go to the Sida Baltic Sea Unit website.

Click here to read the German Institute for International and Security Affairs analysis of the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea.

Click here to download the European Union Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region Action Plan.

Click here to go to the Media21 website.

Click here to visit the Finnish Institute of International Affairs website.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 18 September 2009

EU leaders meeting in Stockholm have discussed the European Union’s Baltic Sea strategy. The Swedish EU Presidency confirmed that the EU heads of state and government are expected to adopt the strategy at the end of October. But analysts question whether the EU will fully implement its Baltic Sea strategy as words in the past have often not been followed by action.

The Swedish EU Presidency of the European Union confirmed today that the EU heads of state and government are expected to adopt the EU’s Baltic Sea strategy at the end of October.

The announcement came after representatives of the European Parliament, the European Commission, the European Investment Bank and European Union member states, together with Toomas Ilves, President of Estonia and Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt discussed the strategy at a meeting in Stockholm.

The strategy indicates that rapid action is needed to clean up the Baltic Sea.

“The environmental objective ranks as a high priority based on the urgency of addressing the ecological and environmental decline of the Baltic Sea in particular,” said the working group that prepared the action plan for the Baltic Sea strategy. “Whilst the development of the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region also needs to address environmental concerns in land areas, the priority given to the marine environment reflects the 2007 European Council conclusions, highlighting that the strategy for the Baltic Sea region must address the urgent environmental challenges related to the Baltic Sea.

“Fulfilment of this objective will also secure the full economic potential of the goods and services provided by the marine ecosystem, thereby improving the well-being and health of people living in the region, and in line with the overall objectives of the Integrated Maritime Policy. The action plan introduces the notion of interdependence of countries in the Baltic Sea region in the field of environment, especially with regard to the pollution of the Baltic Sea.”

The idea behind the strategy for the Baltic Sea is to use the existing EU legislative programmes, to combine funding sources, and to get farming to become more efficient.

The strategy rests on four pillars (environmental sustainability, prosperity, accessibility and attractiveness, and safety and security) and 15 priority areas representing the main areas where the strategy can contribute to improvements (either through tackling the main challenges or through seizing the main opportunities); each priority areas will be the responsibility of one (sometimes several) EU member, which will involve all relevant stakeholders.

The ‘environmental sustainability’ pillar covers:

* Reducing nutrient inputs to the sea to acceptable levels

* Preserving natural zones and biodiversity, including fisheries

* Reducing the use and impact of hazardous substances

* Becoming a model region for clean shipping

* Mitigating and adapting to climate change

The ‘prosperity’ pillar covers:

* Removing barriers to the internal market in the Baltic Sea Region including improving cooperation in the customs and tax area

* Exploiting the full potential of the region in research and innovation

* Implementing the Small Business Act: to promote entrepreneurship, strengthen small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and increase the efficient use of human resources

* Reinforcing the sustainability of agriculture, forestry and fisheries

The ‘accessibility and attractiveness’ pillar covers:

* Improving the access to, and the efficiency and security of, the energy markets

* Improving internal and external transport links

* Maintaining and reinforcing the attractiveness of the Baltic Sea Region in particular through education, tourism and health

The ‘safety and security’ pillar covers:

* Becoming a leading region in maritime safety and security

* Reinforcing protection from major emergencies at sea and on land

* Decreasing the volume of, and harm done by, cross-border crime

Described as a key instrument in promoting territorial cohesion with both land and maritime dimensions, the European Union Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region is thus much broader than cleaning up the Baltic Sea.

In this way, the working group said, “the strategy aims at ensuring that policies at all levels (local, regional, national and at the level of the European Union both for the maritime and terrestrial policies) all contribute to a competitive, cohesive and sustainable development of the region.”

But the working group warned that the current economic crisis affects the actions and flagship projects presented in each section of the action plan.

“This implies a less-favourable climate for investment, affecting both public sectors and private business generally,” the working group said. “This makes it all the more essential that the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region allows the partners in the region to take a longer perspective, recognising that when this crisis has passed the regions that have best prepared will be those best equipped to take advantage of the new opportunities and innovations.”

The European Commission, which considers the proposed actions to be important, suggests that EU members use the crisis as an opportunity to review their priorities.

“In particular, it is an opportunity to pay special attention to the quality of life of citizens which requires a sustainable environment,” the European Commission said. “In addition, the crisis may change the focus of enterprises who may consider it wise to seize the business opportunities of the future in the ‘green businesses’. Moreover, the actions proposed could form part of any national recovery packages as they are likely to create jobs during implementation (e.g. transport and energy infrastructures) and afterwards through an increased accessibility and attractiveness of the region thereby creating economic growth.”

“The Baltic Sea strategy largely has what it takes to become a success,” said Carsten Schymik of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) in ‘Blueprint for a macro-region’, an analysis of the strategy. “Its policy priorities – environment, economy, infrastructure, security – are reasonably well chosen and largely in line with the issue agenda as it is perceived by regional stakeholders.

“However, it is questionable whether the EU strategy will be fully implemented. Neither insightful analysis of regional problems nor proposals for their solution have been in short supply in the past. Yet words have often not been followed by action.”

Schymik said the main obstacle does not seem to be a lack of financial resources, more a lack of political will.

“Although the Baltic Sea strategy fails to receive additional funding from the EU budget, the existing funds have the advantage of being available even under the changed circumstances of the global financial and economic crisis,” he said. “Rather, it is decisive to generate the political will to implement the strategy. This conclusion underscores the relevance of politics as a precondition for the strategy to become a successful model test.”

In his analysis of the EU’s Baltic Sea strategy, Schymik said, “The action plan needs further fine-tuning with regard to deadlines, funding sources and responsible lead partners. Its greatest weakness, though, is a lack of measurable objectives or benchmarks, which would facilitate the progress review of the strategy… So far, benchmarks are only to be found in the environmental pillar of the strategy, at least to the extent that this pillar is based on the Helsinki Commission’s action plan for the Baltic Sea.”

Schymik added that the success of the strategy requires a strong impetus for regional cooperation, a new dynamism that cannot be built upon the prospect of acquiring additional funding or creating new institutions. Nevertheless, the present strategy contains a promising element – the ‘Annual Forum’.

“The idea of an annual forum should be seen as an opportunity to address one of the problems frequently referred to by regional stakeholders, namely the confusing multiplicity of regional networks and organisations, many of them working towards similar goals,” Schymik said. “Such a forum will not necessarily reduce the number of institutional actors in the region, but it could be instrumental to make the regional discourse more structured and focused. It could become a rallying point for the entire Baltic Sea Region.”

He envisaged the annual forum growing into a major event involving a variety of networks and organisations active in the region such as the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS), the Baltic Sea States Subregional Co-operation (BSSSC), the Union of the Baltic Cities (UBC), the Baltic Sea Parliamentary Conference (BSPC), the Nordic Council (NC), the Baltic Assembly (BA), the Baltic Sea Trade Union Network (BASTUN), the Baltic Development Forum (BDF), and the NGO Forum.

In addition, Schymik said, Russia’s role in the context of the strategy remains unclear. In contrast to Norway, Russia did not participate in the consultation process, nor has it given an opinion about the Baltic Sea strategy.

“Russia’s involvement thus remains a matter of discussion and a challenge for the EU and its member states in the Baltic Sea region,” Schymik said. “It would be useful to examine the present state of affairs of EU-Russia relations in the region, based on the question to what extent Russia must, can or may participate in the strategy in order to make it a success. In light of such an analysis it could be considered offering Russia a comprehensive partnership in the framework of the Baltic Sea strategy.”

A survey conducted by the Baltic Sea Unit of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) noted that EU’s Baltic Sea strategy is designed to deliver a more prosperous, environmentally sound, accessible and safe region.

“Hopes for implementing the strategy and reaching its goals are generally high, but are they too high?” the agency asked.

“We believe not and we agree with one of our respondents who maintained that the hopes entailed in the strategy are modest hopes compared to the advances already made in recent decades,” say Thomas Johansson and Mikael Olsson of the Baltic Sea Unit.

But, they said, contacts across this new Mare Nostrum of the EU are not yet intensive enough. This is a worrisome situation, because contacts are the key to generating awareness and fencing off ignorance. In its turn, awareness is a prerequisite for intuitive regional thinking.

“However, at present we still do not know our neighbours well enough to make them a natural first choice when faced with a need or situation of some kind,” added Johansson and Olsson. “Clearly, if thinking and acting regionally is to become the rule rather than the exception, continued attention must be paid to the role of contacts and unprejudiced awareness of the opportunities available in the region.”

Connecting the Baltic Sea region to the surrounding world thus remains a high priority issue, also in the years to come, they said.

Click here to read the Swedish EU Presidency announcement.

Click here to download the European Union Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region Action Plan.

Click here to read the German Institute for International and Security Affairs analysis of the EU strategy for the Baltic Sea.

Click here to go to the Sida Baltic Sea Unit website.

Click here to go to the Helsinki Commission website.

Click here to read more about the EU’s Integrated Maritime Policy

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 14 August 2009

American military personnel were not looking for a hydrogen bomb in the sea off Greenland in 1968, for there was no bomb, a study carried out by the Danish Institute for International Studies shows. What the Americans were looking for was the marshal’s baton – a closed pipe containing uranium 235, the fissile core of the bomb. It may have been destroyed in the explosion or disintegrated in the sea water, but it was apparently not recovered in one piece.

What happened on 21 January 1968, when a US Air Force B-52 bomber carrying four hydrogen bombs crashed on a 70-cm thick layer of ice covering the sea in the Bylot Sound near the Thule Air Force Base in north-western Greenland?

Did the four hydrogen bombs explode, were they destroyed in other ways, or did one of them fall through the ice and water to land on the bottom?

As well as recovering aircraft and bomb debris on the ice, the US military conducted submarine and other searches in the Bylot Sound until the end of August 1968, but without recovering a bomb from the water.

For more than four decades, the official American and Danish explanations have consistently stated that all four nuclear weapons were destroyed in the accident. News reports over the years have nevertheless centred on the fate of this fourth bomb, and on the potential environmental effects resulting from its disintegration by the water.

Last November, the BBC published programmes and articles based on 348 documents on the incident that its security correspondent, Gordon Corera, received from the US Department of Energy’s archives in Las Vegas seven years earlier.

Corera’s main assertions were that only three of the four nuclear weapons on board the B-52 could be accounted for, thus leaving open the possibility that there was still a nuclear weapon on the bottom of the sea in the bay outside Thule, and that the Americans had withheld information about the real purpose of a bottom survey done by a submersible in the summer of 1968, namely that it was looking for the parts of a nuclear weapon.

In ‘The Marshal’s Baton‘, a new report on the incident, the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS) notes that the assertions concerning the bomb in the BBC articles and programmes are identical with claims made by the Thule Workers’ Association in August 2000, which were widely circulated in the Danish and international media at the time.

“Allegations about a ‘missing bomb’ have a long history,” DIIS says, adding that Danish media reports raised the question ‘once again’ in December 1987.

“The Danish foreign minister explained that the US Air Force had never rejected the possibility that parts of one or several bombs could have fallen through the ice, but that it was beyond doubt that the four bombs had been destroyed in the crash,” DIIS states. “He added that the sea bottom surveys performed in August 1968 by the submersible Star III had produced aircraft debris but no bombs.”

Closely interwoven with that topic has been the plutonium balance sheet - the balance between the amounts of plutonium in the bombs and the plutonium that was dispersed as a result of the accident, the institute adds. In September 1988, the Danish prime minister answered questions in Parliament on this issue.

The BBC report last year and a subsequent debate in the Danish parliament led Danish foreign minister Per Stig Møller to ask the Danish Institute for International Studies to draw up a report based on the documentary evidence concerning the 1968 crash.

The DIIS report, published earlier this month, concludes that the American military personnel were not looking for a hydrogen bomb, for there was no bomb. What the Americans were looking for was the marshal’s baton – a closed pipe containing uranium 235, the fissile core of the bomb. It may have been destroyed in the explosion or disintegrated in the sea water, but it was apparently not recovered in one piece.

The foreign minister’s specific question to DIIS was whether the 348 documents (or approximately 2,000 pages) obtained by Corera in 2001 contained decisive new information compared with 317 documents declassified by the US Department of Energy (DOE) from 1986 onwards and released on 15 September 1994. The Thule Radiation Victims Association had requested access to the documents, which were also handed over to the Danish government at its request.

Although the 348 collection does contain a few important documents not found in the 317 collection, none of them have been used in Corera’s reports or articles.

The DIIS report is primarily based on the 348 collection, the same US documents that in many cases have been declassified for nearly two decades, but additionally it takes in a few documents from Danish and other archives.

“There is no evidence that Corera has been working in the Danish archives or that he has tried to verify or nuance his assertion that Denmark was kept in the dark about the purpose of the underwater operation,” the institute notes. What is new in the DIIS report is “not so much the sources as the analysis and interpretation of mostly familiar documents.”

The institute hopes “that a thorough examination of the American documents will provide a better understanding of the complexities met with by the historian, whose task it is to decipher the excised documents, where information that may be of importance for the full understanding of the events is often deleted. We will do our best to establish the nature of the excised parts of the documents in order to try and provide a coherent picture of the reason the deletions were made.”

On the basis of the BBC reports and its review of the documentation, DIIS says, “No new assertions about a missing bomb were made in 2008, and the documentary evidence was much the same as that released by DOE in 1994, which has been available in Copenhagen since then… On this basis, one could argue that there would be nothing to add to the answers provided by the Danish and American authorities in 1995 and 2000.”

But, DIIS adds, perhaps surprisingly, “an impartial professional analysis of the documents has never been undertaken,” probably because “that the focus on matters related to Thule and the US presence there has changed over the years.”

The institute says that, on several counts, the released documents seem to support the official explanation at first glance.

“For instance,” DIIS says, “in an early report of 27 January 1968 – only six days after the crash – the SAC Disaster Control Team reported that ‘based on the serially numbered components found to date, there is convincing evidence that at least three separate WH [warhead] H.E. [high explosives] detonated high order on or above the surface of the ice. This conclusion is based on the location of the four weapon parapacks [packs with parachutes for the weapons], three tritium bottles, and portions of three separate weapon secondaries’ (doc. 107132). This document was declassified as early as 1988.”

[The primary stage of a nuclear bomb contains the fission bomb, the ‘trigger’. The ‘secondary’ stage contains the fissile spark plug (or marshal’s baton in the DIIS report), fusion fuel and uranium tamper; this is the thermo-nuclear stage. A third section, the reservoir or T bottle, contains deuterium tritium gases, which are fed to the primary stage, where the gases fuse into helium and release free neutrons soon after fission begins. The explosion in the first stage triggers the second stage.]

Some of the sources for an historical reconstruction of the events surrounding the recovery of the nuclear weapons after the Thule accident have been excised or made exempt from declassification. Consequently, DIIS says, its conclusions “can not supply irrefutable evidence of past events. This is not unusual for historians, who must be content to establish the likely and the plausible.”

Nevertheless, the institute says, “We have shown beyond any reasonable doubt that all four weapons broke up in the crash and became non-operational: they did not exist as weapons after the crash. This is an indisputable fact already because the deuterium/tritium reservoirs in the tail sections of the four weapons broke off on impact and were recovered close to the impact point.”

Thus, it adds, “there is no bomb, there was no bomb, and the Americans were not looking for a bomb.”

DIIS found strong indications that all four primaries were destroyed in conventional explosions on impact. The plutonium in the primaries of all four weapons was dispersed in particulate form in the explosions and the ensuing fire.

“We have argued that all four secondaries were destroyed as well, but not in all cases with the same devastating consequences for these sections as for the primaries,” DIIS says.

There has been some public disbelief that all four primaries actually exploded, the institute notes. “This disbelief was caused by the idea of a discrepancy between the 24 kg of plutonium thought to be needed to reach criticality in the four primaries taken together, and the approximately 6 kg that the authorities claimed to have been involved in the accident.”

After weeks of consulting the literature and the experts in various fields without result, DIIS finally turned to the disarmament literature and found the answer.

“As a reference value, this gave a figure of roughly 2 kg of plutonium 239 per weapon,” DIIS states. “After that, several other pieces of information pointing in the same direction began to surface. The jewel in the crown in this respect was two lines with three figures in the hand-written minutes of a meeting in Washington held on 5 February 1968. On the basis of these two lines, we arrived at a figure of roughly 7.5 kg plutonium for the four weapons.”

According to DIIS, the amount of plutonium 239 dispersed as very small particles in the conventional explosions of the weapons corresponded roughly to the amount of plutonium 239 actually contained in the weapons to begin with.

The institute says no nuclear weapons have been left on the bottom of the sea in Thule, nor was any secondary left in the sea. The weight of nearly three secondaries (94%) was recovered and shipped to the US. Many of the secondary pieces were small and unnumbered and were found widely scattered on the ice.

“Reaching a figure of 94% by weight for three secondaries seems improbable under the circumstances if pieces from only three weapons had been collected,” DIIS says. “It is much more likely that this figure was reached by recovering pieces from all four secondaries.

“We believe that by April 1968 the US authorities already had a very good idea of what had happened to all four secondaries. If not, it would be incomprehensible how they could ask Sandia Corporation to establish trajectories in the water of Bylot Sound for one special, extremely well-defined weapon component − only one, and certainly from a secondary. This is the second jewel in the crown of the investigation.

“We believe that what the Americans were looking for was the marshal’s baton, the fissile core of a secondary, often referred to as the spark plug,” the institute says in the report. “The object was cylinder-shaped with rounded ends. Its drag coefficient was calculated by Sandia Corporation to be 0.6 head on and 1.0 side on. It could have been a massive rod, but it is far more likely that it was a pipe with sealed ends.”

DIIS says the sources provide ample evidence that such pieces were recovered on the ice in February and March 1968, and that the hunt for the remaining pieces continued to the end of the operation in August 1968.

“If we suppose that the marshal’s baton contained 8 kg of uranium 235, it would have had a volume of roughly four decilitres,” DIIS says. “A cylinder with such a volume could, for instance, be 50 centimetres long with a diameter of 3.3 centimetres, or somewhat thicker if it were a pipe, for instance, 5.4 centimetres with a wall thickness of 5.5 mm.

“This is a rather small object to find on the sea bottom, especially when we remember that it could have broken to pieces and might be located among thousands of other pieces of debris. Yet, it is bigger than a spark plug in a car. We have chosen to call it the marshal’s baton instead. The size fits this description better.

“That an object of this size was indeed what the American Star III submersible was looking for is demonstrated in the video footage from the dives where the claw can be seen recovering an object fitting this description. On closer inspection, the object apparently turned out not to be the sought-after prize.

“Finally,” says DIIS, “we must not forget that the decision-makers and search teams could not be sure that the sought-after component had survived the crash. One would assume that they kept an open mind for the possibility that it had been blown to pieces or completely destroyed in some other fashion.”

The institute reiterates it basic conclusion as, “There is no bomb, there was no bomb, and the Americans were not looking for a bomb. They were looking for the marshal’s baton. Nor were there any whole pieces of any of the primary stages, nor any whole ones of any secondary stage, nor any tail section left behind.

“The Americans were not looking for a bomb but for a weapons component, almost certainly a uranium 235 fissile core from the secondary stage of a weapon,” DIIS says in its report on the B-52 crash in Greenland in January 1968. “They were probably not at all sure if it had actually fallen to the bottom and in what state, nor whether it still existed. Crumbling of uranium metal in water has been observed in many studies. If there were something to be found, they did not find it in the last days of August 1968.”

Click here to read DIIS report 2009:18, ‘The Marshal’s Baton‘.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 13 August 2009

Seventeen male Iraqi asylum-seekers who had sought refuge in a church in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro district were rounded up by the police in the early hours of this morning.

Seventeen failed male Iraqi asylum-seekers who had sought refuge in Brorson’s Church in Copenhagen’s Nørrebro district in May were arrested by the police in riot gear in the early hours of this morning amid violent demonstrations that ended in five arrests and drawn truncheons.

While women, children and the elderly were allowed to stay with friends or acquaintances, the 17 men, and two more who reportedly voluntarily joined the 17, were driven off in a bus to the Bellahøj police station in Copenhagen, where they arrived at about 4.30 to be identified. They were to be transferred to the closed section of the Sandholm asylum camp north of Copenhagen.

“The Sandholm camp is the only place in the country where deported asylum-seekers can stay, so I presume they are on their way there,” Copenhagen Police information officer Flemming Steen Munch said.

He said the arrest of the Iraqi men was requested by the aliens section of the Danish National Police, who wanted to determine their identity.

“We have arrested 17 young men. They will remain in detention while the police find out whether they are among the failed asylum-seekers to be sent back to Iraq,” Flemming Steen Munch added.

He said the police originally entered the church peacefully to talk to the asylum-seekers and persuade them to leave the church peacefully and voluntarily.

“We tried dialogue, but that didn’t work,” Flemming Steen Munch said.

After that, between 20 and 30 police reportedly broke down the church door.

More than 60 Iraqis, whose asylum applications have been rejected by the Danish authorities, have lived in a form of refuge in Brorson’s Church since May, after Denmark and Iraq signed an agreement under which Iraqi nationals, who had failed to gain asylum in Denmark, could be repatriated.

The agreement, which followed a repatriation agreement between Sweden and Iraq, is controversial, partly because Iraq says it will not accept the forcible return of its citizens. On two occasions - the latest yesterday - Iraq has denied that it has agreed to accept failed asylum-seekers who are repatriated against their will.

“There are no such agreements,” Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said on the Iraqi government website. “All talk of the existence of such agreements is a campaign designed to affect the reputation of the Iraqi government among Iraqi refugees.”

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 12 August 2009

Danish shopping hours are to be deregulated in two stages over the next three years, Economic and Business Affairs Minister Lene Espersen said yesterday. Retailers are pleased with the move, but the leading trade union for shop staff is against it.

Denmark’s rather restrictive Sunday shopping hours are to liberalised from 1 July 2010 and deregulated from 1 October 2012 if the Danish parliament adopts bill that will tabled later this year by Economic and Business Affairs Minister Lene Espersen.

According to the plans, all shops will be allowed to open on about 30 Sundays a year from 1 July 2010, compared with the present 20. The 30 days are the first and last Sunday in each month, all Sundays in December, and a further four Sundays that each shop can decide for itself.

Under the later deregulation, from 1 October 2012, the only closing times enforced by law will be on major holidays. Shops must close at 3.00 pm New Year’s Eve and Christmas Eve, and they must be closed all day on New Year’s Day, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Sunday, Easter Monday, Great Prayer Day, Ascension Day, Whitsunday, Whit Monday, Constitution Day, Christmas Day and Boxing Day.

Retailers with annual sales of less than 25 million kroner, as well as shops that sell certain products such as garden tools and plants, would be exempt from the new law.

“It has never been easy to negotiate changes to the shopping hours law as the partners in the retail sector have never been in agreement,” Espersen said at a news conference yesterday. “The two-stage liberalisation harmonises well with the government’s strategy for the legislation, and the shops will have an opportunity to prepare for the liberalisation - also with regard to their staff.”

HK Handel, the major trade union representing shop workers, does not support the proposed changes, which it says will allow shops to remain open 24 hours a day from Constitution Day to Christmas Eve as there are no public holidays between them.

“The shopping hours act is a major issue for us,” the union said. “That’s not because it’s the law that regulates our sector, but because the law has important consequences for the retail trade - both for the development in the number and type of shops and also for the working conditions of the shops’ staff.”

The union warned that deregulation of shopping hours would make it more difficult for smaller shops to compete - both in terms of price and their possibilities of being open for many hours.

“Many small shops have few employees,” HK Handel said. “Therefore it could be very difficult for them to remain open all seven days a week. Shops in outlying districts and smaller specialist shops will find it difficult to survive.”

“If there are no shops in the smaller towns, house prices will fall, elderly people would have to take a bus to buy their milk, and staff in the small shops would lose their jobs,” the union’s deputy chair, Herdis Poulsen, said to the Politiken newspaper. She also predicted that shop workers will have to work on additional Sundays as a result of the proposals, and this would affect their family lives.

Shop owners and wholesalers such as De samvirkende Købmænd (DSK), Dansk Supermarked, Coop Danmark, Dansk Detail, Danmarks Sportshandlerforening and Dansk Erhverv helped negotiate the changes with the Economic and Business Affairs Ministry. They were generally pleased with the proposals.

DSK’s managing director John Wagner saw little change to evening opening hours.

“I don’t think there will be longer opening hours in the evening,” he said to Politiken. “At the moment, the larger shops can be open from 6.00 am on Monday morning until 5.00 pm on Saturday if they want to, but most close at 8.00 pm on weekdays,” he said. “Perhaps they will keep on longer on Saturdays in the larger towns.”

As well as advantages for consumers, Wagner said the proposals do imply disadvantages for the retail sector.

“The number of shops that will disappear will depend on the economy and, not least, of other changes in laws governing commercial enterprises,” he said. “If the 4,000 to 5,000 smallest shops in this country are to survive both the current crisis and the shopping hours deregulation, politicians must not make their situation worse.”

Click here and here to see Pamela Juhl’s video reports from Lene Espersen’s news conference.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 10 August 2009

For 50 years, the South Pole has been free of nuclear weapons. Can this be done for the North Pole as well?

Fifty years ago, 19 months of discussions and negotiations resulted in an international treaty that turned the Antarctic into a region without weapons.

According to the Antarctic Treaty’s article 1, the South Pole is to be used for peaceful purposes only. Military activity, such as weapons testing, is prohibited, but military personnel and equipment may be used for scientific research or any other peaceful purpose.

Article 5 prohibits nuclear explosions or disposal of radioactive wastes.

This treaty has since been followed by other treaties that have set up nuclear-weapon-free zones (NWFZs) in Latin America, the South Pacific, South-East Asia and Central Asia. Mongolia declared itself a NWFZ in 1992, and Africa is only one ratification away from making another continent entirely nuclear weapon free.

All these NWFZs were established in regions where nuclear weapons were absent.

At the North Pole, however, the Soviet Union and its successors in the Russian Federation and the USA have have watched each other closely for political reasons since the end of World War II. They have built up nuclear arsenals and their nuclear-powered warships and submarines have patrolled the Arctic as part of their defences.

Recent reports about two Russian submarines patrolling the waters outside USA have created concern that Russia is upscaling its presence in foreign waters, but Russian Navy officials claim that Russian submarines never stopped patrolling the world’s oceans, reported BarentsObserver.com.

“Russian submarines never stopped patrolling the world’s oceans, but their operations are of a secret character and never commented on by Russian Navy officials,” a high-ranking representative from the Russian Navy Headquarters told RIA Novosti in a comment on the report in New York Times. “Even in the hard 1990s Russian submarines sailed the oceans on combat alert duty,” the source said.

The American newspaper referred earlier this week to a source in the Pentagon who said that a pair of nuclear-powered Russian attack submarines had been patrolling off the eastern seaboard of the United States and called it “a rare mission that has raised concerns inside the Pentagon and intelligence agencies about a more assertive stance by the Russian military”.

The two submarines were reported to be of the Akula-class attack submarines. Both the Russian Northern Fleet and the Pacific Fleet have several subs of this class.

Citing a government press release, BarentsObserver.com also reported that Russia will next year increase its spending on new military equipment and upgrades with 1.2% to a total of 470 billion roubles (76 billion kroner), despite the current economic crisis and major cuts in public spending.

Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov confirmed that the government in 2010 intends to spend 470 billion roubles on new and upgrades equipment for its armed forces.

Being concrete on the most important acquisitions, Ivanov mentioned the development of the country’s strategic missile complexes, modern ships and submarines, as well as aircrafts type Su-27 CM, Su-30 MK-2, Su-35 and Su-34. Russia also intends to invest in the Iskander-M missile complex and the X-102 cruiser missiles for its air force.

However, the deputy Prime Minister did not mention the Borei-class submarines and the Bulava missile complex, although experts say that up to 40% of the military spending currently is invested in these.

Peace activists have wanted to stop the deployment of nuclear weapons in the Arctic region for many years.

Perhaps a combination of the negative effects of global warming, the May 2010 conference reviewing the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (also called the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, NPT or NNPT) and the recent agreement between the USA and Russia to discuss further cuts in their nuclear weapons arsenals will be steps on the path towards a nuclear-weapons-free zone around the North Pole.

The rapid shrinking of the Arctic’s polar ice will not only produce rising ocean levels in the region and globally, but will also open Arctic waters to new shipping lanes and exploration of the Arctic seabed previously prevented by an impenetrable ice cap. There is already evidence that increasing commercial and exploratory navigation is producing additional military deployment. This may be connected with countries wishing to protect their territorial claims to the Arctic – which is believed to be rich in natural resources and where as much as 25% of the world’s undiscovered oil reserves may be found.

A seminar arranged by the Danish Institute for International Studies today discussed a number of aspects of creating a nuclear-weapons-free zone around the North Pole. Would a regional NWFZ including those Arctic nations that are already free from nuclear weapons (Canada, Iceland, Greenland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland) be a logical first step? What steps can we take to demilitarize and protect the Arctic from accidental or intentional use of nuclear weapons?

The Copenhagen Voice talked about the prospects for a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Arctic to professor Michael Hamel-Green, executive dean at the faculty of arts, education and human development at Victoria University in Australia; Adele Buckley, a member of the executive committee of the Pugwash Council in Canada, which is affiliated to the Pugwash Conferences on science and world affairs; and Steven Staples, president of the Rideau Institute on International Affairs, an independent research, advocacy, and consulting group in Canada that provides research, analysis and commentary on public policy issues.

“The Government of Canada has made the Arctic a priority and has developed an Integrated Northern Strategy,” an advisor to Canadian Ambassador Peter Lundy told the Copenhagen Voice. “The strategy rests on four pillars: protecting our environmental heritage, promoting economic and social development, exercising our sovereignty, and improving and devolving governance. Our foreign policy delivers on the international dimension of each of the four elements in this strategy, thereby affirming our leadership, stewardship and ownership in the region.”

According to the Government of Canada’s Arctic region website, Canada has a policy objective of non-proliferation, reduction and elimination of nuclear weapons, which it pursues “persistently and energetically, consistent with our membership in NATO and NORAD and in a manner sensitive to the broader international security context.”

The policy is rooted in the three “pillars” of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT): non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, disarmament of nuclear weapons stockpiles and the right of all NPT states to the peaceful uses of nuclear energy in accordance with non-proliferation obligations.

In addition, Canadian policy also recognizes the utility of counter-proliferation initiatives to address non-state actors and states that attempt to circumvent the international nuclear non-proliferation regime.

“Our responsibility is to strengthen Canada’s national security by formulating, advocating and negotiating effective nuclear non-proliferation, arms control, and disarmament policies, strategies and agreements in collaboration with other divisions within the Nuclear and Chemical Disarmament Implementation Agency (DFAIT) and with other government departments and agencies,” the government website states.

Click here to read the BarentsObserver.com’s Russian Navy patrol report.

Click here to read the BarentsObserver.com’s military spending report.

Click here to see the interview with Michael Hamel-Green.

Click here to see the interview with Adele Buckley and Steven Staples.

Click here to go to the website of the Danish Institute for International Studies.

Click here to go to the Pugwash website.

Click here to go to the Rideau Institute’s website.

Click here to go to Canada’s Arctic region website.

Click here to go to Canada’s Northern Strategy website.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 6 August 2009

Israel had both a right and an obligation to take military action against Hamas in Gaza to stop Hamas’ rocket and mortar attacks on thousands of Israeli civilians and its other acts of terrorism, the Israeli government says in a report released on 30 July.

Israel acknowledges that the Gaza Operation resulted in many civilian deaths and injuries and significant damage to public and private property in Gaza. Israel makes no attempt to minimise the human costs incurred.

According to the report, ‘The Operation in Gaza 27 December 2008 – 18 January 2009: Factual and Legal Aspects’, Israel was bombarded by some 12,000 rockets and mortar shells between 2000 and 2008, including nearly 3,000 rockets and mortar shells in 2008 alone.

“Hamas specifically timed many of its attacks to terrorise schoolchildren in the mornings and the afternoons,” the report’s executive summary states. “These deliberate attacks caused deaths, injuries, and extensive property damage; forced businesses to close; and terrorised tens of thousands of residents into abandoning their homes.”

In addition, the report says, Hamas constantly worked to increase the range of its weapons and that, by late 2008, its rocket fire was capable of reaching some of Israel’s largest cities and strategic infrastructure, threatening one million Israeli civilians, including nearly 250,000 schoolchildren. Hamas also orchestrated numerous suicide bombings against Israeli civilians and amassed an extensive armed force of more than 20,000 armed operatives in Gaza.

Israel pursued numerous non-military approaches to try to stop the attacks before commencing the Gaza Operation. These included urgent appeals to the UN Secretary General and successive Presidents of the Security Council to take determined action, and diplomatic overtures, directly and through intermediaries, to stop the violence.

Hamas nonetheless continued, and in fact escalated, its cross-border attacks, the report states. These attacks included a raid into Israeli territory from Gaza in June 2006 and the abduction of an Israeli Defence Force (IDF) soldier, Corporal Gilad Shalit, who, more than three years later, remains in captivity, having been held incommunicado without access to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) or any other international body.

In a detailed legal analysis, including a survey of the relevant legal principles and state practice, the report notes that Israel’s resort to force in the Gaza Operation was both a necessary and a proportionate response to Hamas’ attacks.

The report offers only a provisional analysis as the IDF is still conducting comprehensive field and criminal investigations into allegations regarding the conduct of its forces during the Gaza Operation.

“Such investigations will be reviewed by the Military Advocate General and are subject to further review by the Attorney General,” the report notes. “In addition, petitions may be filed for judicial review by the Supreme Court of Israel (sitting as the High Court of Justice).”

While the IDF continues to investigate specific incidents during the Gaza Operation, the report demonstrates that Israeli commanders and soldiers were guided by international humanitarian law, including the principles of distinction and proportionality.

“These principles, enshrined in IDF training, Code of Ethics and rules of engagement, required IDF forces to direct their attacks solely against military objectives and to try to ensure that civilians and civilian objects would not be harmed,” the report states. “Where incidental damage to civilians or civilian property could not be avoided, the IDF made extraordinary efforts to ensure that it would not be excessive in relation to the anticipated military advantage in each instance and as a whole. Both before and during the Gaza Operation, the IDF went to great lengths, as documented in the Paper, to ensure that humanitarian aid reached the Palestinian population, including by facilitating the delivery of 1,511 trucks carrying 37,162 tons.”

According to the report, Hamas committed clear grave violations of international law both before and during the Gaza Operation.

The report documents Hamas’ deliberate rocket and mortar attacks against Israel’s civilian population, which violated the international law prohibition on deliberate attacks against civilians and civilian objects.

It also documents deliberate Hamas tactics that put Gaza’s civilian population in grave danger. These included the launching of rocket attacks from within densely populated areas near schools and protected UN facilities, the commandeering of hospitals as bases of operations and ambulances for transport, the storage of weapons in mosques, and the booby-trapping of entire civilian neighbourhoods so that an attack on one structure would devastate many others.

“These actions, which are clearly shown in photographic and video evidence throughout the report, violated international law,” the report says. “Many of the civilian deaths and injuries, and a significant amount of the damage to property during the Gaza Operation, were attributable to Hamas’ tactic of blending in with the civilian population and its use of, or operations near, protected facilities and civilian property.”

The report also notes the direct injury and damage caused to Palestinians by the explosion of Hamas’ weapons factories and the falling of rockets short of their targets on Palestinians in Gaza.

The report says Israel faced acute dilemmas in confronting an adversary using its own civilian population as a shield. It details the extensive precautions taken by the IDF to avoid or limit harm to civilians in Gaza, while still having to achieve the necessary objective of stopping Hamas’ constant rocket and mortar fire on Israeli civilians and property.

According to the report, “The IDF not only checked and cross-checked targets and used the least destructive munitions possible to achieve legitimate military objectives; it also implemented an elaborate system of warnings, including general warnings to civilians (through media broadcasts and leaflets) to avoid or minimise the presence of civilians in areas and facilities used by Hamas, regional warnings to alert civilians to leave specific areas before IDF operations commenced, and specific warnings (through telephone calls and warning shots to rooftops) to warn civilians to evacuate specific buildings targeted for attack. The IDF dropped more than 2.5 million leaflets and made more than 165,000 phone calls warning civilians to distance themselves from military targets.”

Israel acknowledges in the report that the Gaza Operation resulted in many civilian deaths and injuries and significant damage to public and private property in Gaza despite the precautions taken by the IDF. Israel makes no attempt to minimise the human costs incurred.

As former Prime Minister Olmert stated at the close of the conflict: “On behalf of the Government of Israel, I wish to convey my regret for the harming of uninvolved civilians, for the pain we caused them, for the suffering they and their families suffered as result of the intolerable situation created by Hamas.”

But in analysing the legal aspects of the conflict, the report notes that civilian deaths and damage to property, even when considerable, do not necessarily mean that violations of international law as such have occurred

In particular, the report says, “the principles of distinction and proportionality are only violated when there is an intention to target civilians or to target military objectives with the knowledge that it would cause harm to civilians that is excessive in relation to the anticipated military advantage. Hamas’ deliberate attacks against Israel’s civilian population violated such standards and thus constituted a violation of international law. The IDF’s attacks directed against Hamas military targets, despite their unfortunate effects on Gaza’s civilian population, did not.”

Israel’s efforts to coordinate and facilitate humanitarian relief and assistance to the Palestinians in Gaza are also covered by the report. It also documents repeated Hamas abuses of these arrangements, including Hamas’ launching of attacks during humanitarian pauses and directed at crossing points, and Hamas’ hijacking and theft of humanitarian supplies intended for those in need.

In addition, the report gives previously unpublished details of the multiple IDF investigations into allegations made by various groups that violations of the law were committed.

“IDF investigative teams are currently examining approximately 100 complaints, including 13 criminal investigations opened so far, and will examine more complaints if and when filed,” the report states.

It provides the preliminary findings of some of the IDF field investigations, including investigations relating to allegations concerning 1) incidents where UN and international facilities were fired upon or damaged; 2) incidents involving shooting at medical facilities, buildings, vehicles, and crews; 3) certain incidents in which many civilians were harmed; 4) the use of munitions containing white phosphorous; and 5) destruction of private property and infrastructure by ground forces.

The report “provides as much information as can be released with regard to the investigations currently underway without comprising the integrity and independence of these investigations.”

According to the Israeli government report, the field investigations constitute only the preliminary stage of an extensive legal process. They are subject to independent review by the Military Advocate General, who may order the opening of a criminal investigation. The decisions of the Military Advocate General are subject to review by the Attorney General and may also be reviewed by the Israeli Supreme Court (sitting as the High Court of Justice).

“Israel’s system for investigating alleged violations, including its judicial review process, is internationally recognised as thorough and independent,” the report says. Israel’s procedures and institutions are similar to those in other Western countries, it adds.

“Israel deeply regrets the civilian losses that occurred during the Gaza Operation,” the government report states. “But Israel has both the responsibility and the right under international law, as does every state, to defend its civilians from intentional rocket attacks. It believes that it discharged that responsibility in a manner consistent with the rules of international law.

“Israel is committed to a thorough investigation of all allegations to the contrary and to making the results of these investigations and subsequent reviews public when they are completed.”

Click here to read the full report.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 8 July 2009

Human rights activitists fear that pro-democracy demonstrators were among prisoners hanged last weekend or killed in other ways in prison. Demonstrators have also been tortured, a witness says.

A group of human rights activists living in different parts of the world, but related to Iran, is investigating whether pro-democracy demonstrators were among prisoners who were hanged recently at a prison near Teheran.

Citing the state-run Iranian news agency Fars, the group, Iran Human Rights, said 20 people were hanged in the Rajaee shahr prison of Karaj (west of Tehran) early on 4 July. The Fars report stated that ‘all those hanged were convicted of drug trafficking between 2004 and 2008, and were between 35 and 48 years of age’.

The human rights organisaton said Rajaee shahr prison is not normally used for executions, but used under special situations.

“34 people have been executed in Iran in the past four days, and 26 of the executions have taken place in Tehran,” said Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, spokesperson of Iran Human Rights. “There is no doubt that these executions are meant to spread fear among the people and suppress further the pro-democracy movement in Iran.”

Amiry-Moghaddam’s comments were supported by a source who talked to the Norwegian daily newspaper Aftenposten.

The source has demanded full anonymity because of the large personal risks involved in speaking with foreign media. The source sympathises with the opposition and has a position in Iran giving in-depth knowledge of how the authorities are reacting to the situation that has arisen since the presidential election on 12 June, says the newspaper.

“The prisoners are subjected to advanced torture,” the souce said. “The families of those arrested can also be subjected to physical or mental abuse to get them to talk.”

On Sunday 14 June, Aftenposten’s journalists witnessed Iranian special forces forcing frightened young men from the street demonstrations into the basement of the ministry of the interior, where they were bound with plastic strips and forced to squat with their faces towards the wall.

The police said the demonstrators were being detained ‘indefinitely’.

Asked whether the lives of such prisoners were now at stake, the source said: “Yes, what you described is a typical example of what happened after the election. The authorities said that just over 1,000 were arrested in connection with the demonstrations. We believe the number is considerably higher, perhaps twice as many. There are a lot of people who are just ‘missing’ and their families have no information about them. We are gravely concerned about what can happen to these prisoners. On the basis of our previous experience with the regime’s repression, I believe that at least 50 of the demonstrators will be hanged or killed in other ways in the prisons in the near future.”

Aftenposten said its source referred to the events of 8 July 1999, when a peaceful student demonstration in Teheran against the closure of the Salam newspaper turned into a riot. Salam was the mouthpiece of the reform movement led by Iran’s then president, Mohammad Khatami. The peaceful demonstration was followed by an attack on a student dormitory that night by riot police in which a student was killed. This in turn sparked six days of demonstrations and rioting throughout the country in which at least three more people were killed and more than 200 injured.

According to Amiry-Moghaddam, “Several thousand people have been arrested following the last three weeks’ demonstrations in Iran. Many of them are in danger of torture, forced confession and execution. The world community, UN, EU and all countries with diplomatic ties with Iran must do whatever they can in order to stop the bloodshed started by the Iranian regime.”

Amiry-Moghaddam continued: “The world must act now, before it is too late! We also ask the world community to support the legitimate demands of the Iranian people and not to recognize results of the recent Iranian election.”

Iran Human Rights is a group of human rights activists living in different parts of the world. Most have Iranian origin or live inside Iran. The aim of group is to put focus on the human rights situation in Iran and contribute to its improvement.

Click here to go to Iran Human Rights’ website.

Click here to read Aftenposten’s Norwegian story.

Click here to read the Copenhagen Voice story, ‘New demonstrations planned in Iran on Thursday - FFFI’.

Click here to read the Copenhagen Voice report, ‘Iran clerics declare election invalid, condemn crackdown - The Times’.

Click here to read the Copenhagen Voice story, ‘Eight hungers strikers fight high temperatures for democracy in Iran’.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 7 July 2009

Israel has strongly rejected an EU official’s allegation that Israeli settlements impact negatively on the Palestinian economy.

Senior Deputy Director General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Rafael Barak, has called on the head of the EU delegation to Israel, Ambassador Ramiro Cibrian Uzal, to explain a statement made on 6 July 2009 by an EC official that Israeli security measures and settlements are “strangling the Palestinian economy” and perpetuating PA dependence on donors.

According to reports, a technical assistant employed by ECTAO, the European Commission Technical Assistance Office, which works in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, said, “[I]t is the European taxpayers who pay most of the price of this dependence.” The funding includes US$280 million so far this year, because settlements prevent the PA from functioning normally.

Ambassador Barak stated that Israel strongly rejects the political allegations made by the technical assistant.

The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said political statements of this nature clearly fall outside the mandate of the ECTAO office in question, which is charged with a purely technical role in the channelling of assistance.

The statement itself is also clearly unfounded, the ministry said. It ignores the fact that the issue of settlements has been agreed by the parties to be addressed in parallel with the fulfilment of other obligations - including Palestinian security obligations - and also that, in its disengagement plan, Israel, by dismantling all settlements in the Gaza Strip and several in the West Bank, went considerably beyond its obligations under existing agreements.

Even more troubling to Israel is the technical assistant’s implication that Israeli security measures in the West Bank are unnecessary and even illegal, alongside a total failure to recognize that it is the continued activity of Palestinian terrorist groups which makes such measures an unfortunate necessity.

The statement also chose to ignore the recent improvements in the West Bank economy, the ministry said. Recent World Bank, IMF and Palestinian Ministry of Finance data point to significant improvement of the Palestinian economy, even during the current global financial crisis. Indeed, official Palestinian data indicates that the West Bank has shown economic growth rates of 5-7% in 2008.

The Middle East Quartet (United Nations, European Union, Russian Federation, and the United States), in a statement issued on 26 June 2009, welcomed plans by the government of Israel to promote Palestinian economic development and declared its readiness to work closely with Israel, the Palestinian government and international donors in order to achieve sustainable economic development. Furthermore, the transfer of EU financial aid to the PA is carried out with the support and cooperation of the State of Israel.

According to the ministry, the Quartet recognized in this statement that Israel has legitimate security concerns that must continue to be safeguarded. In fact, it is the improved security cooperation between Israel and the Palestinian Authority that has made possible the removal of 140 checkpoints and roadblocks in recent months. These measures, which even won recognition by the Palestinian media, are expected to double real economic growth in the West Bank, from 5% to 10%. Regretfully, these facts were not deemed worthy of mention by the European official.

Ultimately, a vibrant, stable economy will be achieved through the resumption of negotiations between Israel and the PA, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. In the meantime, the European technical assistant would do well to concentrate his efforts on the tasks for which he is responsible, instead of making unfounded accusations against Israel.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 6 July

While Iran’s biggest group of clerics declares President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s re-election to be illegitimate and condemns the subsequent crackdown, US President Barack Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden say the accelerating crackdown on opposition leaders in Iran in recent days will not deter them from seeking to engage the country’s top leadership in direct negotiations.

Iran’s biggest group of clerics has declared President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s re-election to be illegitimate and condemned the subsequent crackdown, The Times said today on its website, Timesonline.

The statement by the Association of Researchers and Teachers of Qom is an act of defiance against the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has made clear he will tolerate no further challenges to Ahmadinejad’s “victory” over Mir Hossein Mousavi.

“It’s a clerical mutiny,” said one Iranian analyst. “This is the first time ever you have all these big clerics openly challenging the leader’s decision.” Another, in Tehran, said: “We are seeing the birth of a new political front.”

Professor Ali Ansari, head of Iranian Studies at St Andrews University, said: “It’s highly significant. It shows this is nowhere near resolved.”

The association’s statement also shows how deeply the political establishment is divided, and the extent to which the Supreme Leader now derives his power from military might, not moral authority. It makes it much harder for the regime to arrest Mousavi and other opposition leaders.

At the weekend a top aide to Khamenei demanded that Mousavi and other opponents be tried for “terrible crimes”, and the elite Revolutionary Guards accused them of “trying to overthrow the Islamic establishment”.

In the US, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr, in separate interviews this weekend, said that the accelerating crackdown on opposition leaders in Iran in recent days would not deter them from seeking to engage the country’s top leadership in direct negotiations, The New York Times said.

In an interview with The New York Times, a day before his scheduled departure for Moscow on Sunday, Obama said he had “grave concern” about the arrests and intimidation of Iran’s opposition leaders, but insisted, as he has throughout the Iranian crisis, that the repression would not close the door on negotiations with the Iranian government.

“We’ve got some fixed national security interests in Iran not developing nuclear weapons, in not exporting terrorism, and we have offered a pathway for Iran to rejoining the international community,” Obama said.

Biden echoed the same themes in an interview conducted in Iraq and broadcast Sunday on the ABC News program “This Week.” But in a rare foray into one of the most sensitive issues in the Middle East, the vice president argued that the United States “cannot dictate” Israel’s decisions about whether to strike the plants at the heart of Iran’s nuclear program. He said only Israelis could determine “that they’re existentially threatened” by the prospect that Iran would gain nuclear weapons capability.

The emphasis was different in a separate appearance by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, who warned that any military strike on Iran “could be very destabilizing.” Asked to choose between military action and permitting Iran to gain nuclear weapons capability, he said both would be “really, really bad outcomes.”

Sweden, which currently holds the rotating Presidency of the European Union, said yesterday, “The Presidency strongly condemns the executions in Iran during the past few days, in particular the execution of 20 persons in Iran on 4 July, in the city of Karaj.

“The Presidency continues to call on the Iranian authorities to abolish the death penalty completely and, in the meantime, to establish a moratorium on executions as urged by United Nations General Assembly resolutions 62/149 and 63/168.”

Click here to read the full story on Timesonline.

Click here to read the New York Times story, ‘Despite Crisis, Policy on Iran Is Engagement’.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 14 July 2009

If people were not allowed to voice their demands in peaceful gatherings, it “could destroy the foundation of any government,” regardless of its power, wrote Ayatollah Montazeri on 25 June in a warning to Iran’s leaders.

Almost two weeks after the controversial presidential election in Iran, Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, the most senior dissident cleric in Iran and from 1979 to 1989 the heir apparent of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, issued what is being called a fatwa on 25 June, warning the authorities that trying to stifle dissent would prove to be futile, according to Förenade föreningar för ett fri Iran (FFFI), an umbrella organisation for Swedish-based organisations wanting democratic changes in Iran.

If people were not allowed to voice their demands in peaceful gatherings, it “could destroy the foundation of any government,” regardless of its power, he wrote. Ayatollah Montazeri fell out of favour with the ruling clerics by questioning their almost limitless powers. He has been in house arrest since 1989.

“Officials who have religiously and rationally lost authority and custodianship in social affairs are automatically dismissed from their positions,” Montazeri wrote. “Their authority has no legitimacy whatsoever. And if they remain in their position through coercion, deceit or fraud, the people must voice those officials’ illegitimacy and lack of credibility and demand their removal from those positions through the most effective and least costly methods.

“Obviously, this is a duty for all people. It falls upon everyone in society, the elite and the laymen alike, depending on their knowledge and abilities. No one can shed this responsibility under any pretext.”

Montazeri wrote that the elite of society are more aware of the religion and law, more capable and wield more influence. As such, they have a more serious mandate. Through unity, like-mindedness and establishing of parties and organizations as well as private and public meetings, they must inform others and present a solution to them.

“Religion, logic and learned people around the world condemn and consider as worthless a government based on coercion, oppression and aggression against the rights of other people; a government which has usurped and manipulated the people’s votes, killed, arrested, detained and applied medieval and Stalinist tortures on them; a government that represses, censors the newspapers, disrupts communication and imprisons the elite in society on bogus charges and forces them to make false confessions, especially in prison,” Montazeri wrote.

“According to credible accounts from the family of the Prophet and his direct descendents, extracting confessions in prison has absolutely no religious and legal legitimacy and cannot be the basis for issuing a sentence,” the Ayatollah wrote. “Iran’s valiant people are fully aware of the reality of these confessions which conjure up recorded examples in fascist and communist regimes. It is common knowledge that such confessions and fabricated television interviews have been obtained through force, torture and threats in order to conceal cases of oppression and injustice.

“Those ordering, perpetrating and assisting in such confessions and false interviews are sinners and offenders,” he wrote. “From a religious and legal standpoint, they deserve punishment.”

Montazeri wrote that the Shah heard the sound of the Iranian people’s revolution only when it was too late. The Ayatollah hoped that officials in charge do not allow the situation to get to that point and show flexibility toward the demands of their own citizens as soon as possible.

“The sooner we can exercise damage control the better,” he wrote. “It is beholden on everyone to comprehend and sense the deliberate opposition of the rulers to the religion and the law. Others must be informed as well. Everyone has a responsibility when encountering injustice and the violation of the people’s rights depending on his/her own awareness and capability. One cannot assume that someone could believe in justice but not take any steps in realizing it or for that matter, be afraid or take a wait and see attitude on the pretext of not having enough power. To fear man is to commit to the most serious cardinal sin of duality.”

Click here to read the Copenhagen Voice story, ‘Iran human rights organisation investigating whether pro-democracy demonstrators have been hanged’.

Click here to read the Copenhagen Voice story, ‘Iran clerics declare election invalid, condemn crackdown - The Times’.

Click here to read Farhang Jahanpour’s comments in the Copenhagen Voice, ‘Iran’s Supreme Leader silences the opposition’.

Click here to read the Copenhagen Voice report, ‘No revolution coming in Iran, what we see is the beginning of the end’.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 5 July 2009

In ‘Oil companies reject Iraq’s terms’, its website story on 30 June, the BBC reported: “Only one of the bidders for the eight contracts to run oil and gas fields in Iraq has accepted oil ministry terms.”

Six oil fields and two gas fields were available in a televised auction that was the first big oil tender in Iraq since the invasion of 2003, the BBC said.

BP and China’s CNPC agreed to run the 17 billion barrel Rumaila field after Exxon Mobil turned it down.

Iraq has asked the rest of the companies to consider resubmitting bids for the other seven contracts.

The oil ministry is offering 20-year service contracts.

Other fields have failed to find buyers, either because there were no bidders or because terms were declined.

Thirty-two oil companies had been approved as potential bidders.

For each field, the ministry specified a minimum production level, which was close to the amount that is currently being produced.

In a red envelope, the auctioneers have the maximum amount that the oil ministry is prepared to pay.

Those amounts were significantly less than the oil companies were asking for, so the winning bidders were asked to cut their prices.

In the case of the Rumaila field, Exxon Mobil declined to accept the ministry’s maximum payment, but BP and CNPC, which had originally asked for $4 a barrel, agreed to do the work for $2 a barrel.

They will also be able to charge the ministry for the costs of the work they have to do on the production facilities.

The contracts are subject to approval by the cabinet.

Other winning bidders declined to accept the ministry’s maximum payments.

This caused the British political current affairs magazine New Statesman to write in a leader: ‘It was Alan Greenspan who first let slip. In 2007, to the great glee of the anti-war movement, the elder statesman of American finance recognised that the real motive for the Iraq War had little to do with weapons of mass destruction.”

The New Statesman quoted the former Federal Reserve chairman as writing in his memoirs: “I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq War is largely about oil.”

On 30 June, the magazine said, US troops began their much-anticipated withdrawal from Iraqi cities at the same time as the Iraqi government began to auction off some of the nation’s largest oilfields to companies such as Royal Dutch Shell, British Petroleum and Exxon Mobil. As Iraqis spilled out on to the streets to celebrate a “day of national sovereignty”, foreign multinationals jostled each other, live on Iraqi television, to bid for the 20-year rights to six fields that hold more than five billion barrels of cheap and easily extractable crude oil.

The price paid by the Iraqis has been high, the New Statesman added.

For six years, Iraq has been plagued by levels of violence, bloodshed and insecurity unmatched anywhere else on earth. The death toll is estimated at somewhere between 100,000 and a million, with more than four million Iraqis uprooted from their homes. The country has been shattered economically and socially – Iraqis continue to lack basic electricity and clean water; unemployment still stands at roughly 30 per cent; disease and malnutrition remain rampant.

On the eve of the invasion, in March 2003, this magazine warned that opponents of the war could only “hope 
for a quick end and a painless liberation for Iraq”. If only.

Click here to read the BBC story, ‘Oil companies reject Iraq’s terms’.

Click here to read the News Statesman leader, ‘Oil is still a dark stain on Iraq’.

By Michael de Laine, the Copenhagen Voice, Malmö, Sweden, 4 July 2009

The sun is beating down from an almost cloudless sky and the thermometer reads 28 degrees C in the centre of Malmö, the Swedish city just across the Sound from Copenhagen.

It’s almost too hot to sit in the sun, yet eight representatives of Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran (Association for Democracy in Iran), a Swedish organisation promoting democracy in Iran, prefer to sit on benches in Gustav Adolfs torg than in their overheated tents.

Their spirits are good and they are drinking a lot to keep their strength up, but finding it difficult to fight the heat without food, says Ardavan Khoshnood, the association’s chair. Nor have they slept well because of the night life in this bustling city.

“Many of us have been burned very strongly by the beating sun, which has contributed to complications, including shivers and tremors, and some have developed fevers,” he adds. “But that is the price you pay for democracy and liberty.”

This is the third day of the hunger strike, which is due to end at 6 pm tomorrow, 5 July.

The association is using the strike to call on the Swedish government to cut all ties with Iran. It says that the Islamic Republic of Iran has been shaken by massive demonstrations for several weeks. People wanting the Islamic Republic to be toppled and crying for freedom and democracy have been met with batons and bullets.

“Today it is more imperative than ever that the Swedish government should follow this demand, as the whole world has witnessed how the Islamic Republic has murdered and violently maltreated people who have called for freedom and human rights,” says Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran.

Although many Swedish politicians and political organisations are engaged in the annual week of political meetings at Almedalen on Gotland, which ended today, politicians have taken an interest in the hunger strike, but apparently not in severing ties with Iran.

The many Swedes who have passed by the tents have also taken an interest. Many want to help through cash donations, but Khoshnood told them to join the association and lobby the politicians instead.

A group of Iranians also visited the hunger-strikers on Friday. They have just arrived from Iran and are going back in two weeks.

“They said they had heard about us on Iranian radio and wanted to let us know that they hoped Iran would be liberated soon,” Khoshnood says. “It’s things like this that give us the power we need to get us through this ordeal.”

Click here and here to see the Copenhagen Voice interview with Arvada Khoshnood.

Click here to go to Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran’s website.

Click here to read Karin Bergquist’s story for the Copenhagen Voice ‘Iran: The genie is out of the bottle‘.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 1 July 2009

A Swedish organisation promoting democracy in Iran has called a three-day hunger strike to get the Swedish government to cut all ties with Iran. The hunger strike, in Malmö, starts tomorrow.

Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran (Association for Democracy in Iran), a Swedish organisation promoting democracy in Iran, has called a three-day hunger strike to get the Swedish government to cut all ties with Iran.

The organisation says that the Islamic Republic of Iran has been shaken by massive demonstrations for several weeks in which people who have called for the Islamic Republic to be toppled and for freedom and democracy have been met with batons and bullets.

“It is difficult not to be overwhelmed when seeing the many demonstrators in Iran shout ‘Down with the Islamic Republic’,” says Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran.

Since it was founded, the organisation has called on the Swedish government to break its diplomatic relations with Iran.

“Today it is more imperative than ever that the Swedish government should follow this demand, as the whole world has witnessed how the Islamic Republic has murdered and violently maltreated people who have called for freedom and human rights,” says Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran.

To drive its point home, the organisation is arranging a three-day hunger strike that will take place at Gustav Adolfs torg in Malmö from 2 July at 6.00 pm to 6.000 pm on Sunday 5 July.

Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran is inviting all Swedish and Iranian organisations, parties and associations, as well as individuals, who support the Iranian people’s fight for freedom to join the hunger strike, says Ardavan Khoshnood, the organisation’s chair.

“We’re demanding that Sweden break all diplomatic relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran,” Ardavan Khoshnood adds. “We also demand that Sweden stands behind the Iranian people as they strive to bring down the Islamic Republic and introduce a secular and democratic government system.”

Click here to go to Föreningen för Demokrati i Iran’s website.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 1 July 2009

Afghanistan, extremism and the complex regional situation in South Asia are among the biggest global security challenges today, according to Denmark’s Minister of Foreign Affairs. There are no easy or quick-fix solutions for Afghanistan, which needs a long-term commitment.

Afghanistan, extremism and the complex regional situation in South Asia are among the biggest global security challenges today, Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs Per Stig Møller told a meeting of the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC) Security Forum, held in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, on 25 June 2009.

“It is a challenge we must meet jointly,” he told the meeting’s delegates.

The minister said there is the need for a regional perspective.

“It has become increasingly clear that the security situation in Afghanistan to a high degree depends on its neighbours,” Per Stig Møller said. “Security and development in Afghanistan must be viewed in a regional context.”

The Danish foreign minister said the most obvious risk to the security and stability of Afghanistan springs from the border areas towards Pakistan, which are largely outside the control of both governments.

“It is not a secret that borders are porous at best, and that this has been to the advantage of the insurgents,” he said. “Finding a sustainable solution to this naturally involves increased collaboration with Pakistan.”

Pakistan is also facing great challenges, some of which are interlinked with the situation in Afghanistan, the minister said. But it is important to acknowledge that Pakistan’s problems must be approached in their own right.

“The situation in Pakistan is extremely complex and chaotic,” Per Stig Møller said. “Presently about three million people are displaced. With the government’s recent decision to expand the fighting to also include the stronghold of Pakistani Taliban in Waziristan, this figure is doomed to increase. The importance of a coordinated international response to the humanitarian crisis cannot be underestimated – the cost of insufficient international assistance could be increased radicalization and Taliban exploiting the situation to new recruitment.”

He stressed that if this situation is not handled well, tomorrow’s Taliban will be created today.

“In this context, the group ‘Friends of Democratic Pakistan’ could play a key role as a key forum for coordinating international assistance,” Per Stig Møller said. “‘Friends of Democratic Pakistan’ is a demonstration of the international commitment to support the beleaguered democracy in Pakistan.”

The Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs said it is clear that stability and development in Afghanistan are also closely linked to Afghanistan’s other neighbours, not least Iran.

“It is important that the international community engages all of Afghanistan’s neighbours and closest partners in a dialogue and practical cooperation to improve the situation,” he said. “We have an apparent and mutual interest in a stable Afghanistan, which can form the basis for such interaction. If not, Afghanistan can say to its neighbours: ‘Today us, tomorrow you’.

“It is therefore imperative that we find ways to support the development of a stable region. And we need to address cross-boundary and regional issues not only for the sake of Afghanistan, but to improve regional and global security as such.”

Per Stig Møller welcomed NATO’s decision to further develop the alliance’s engagement with all of Afghanistan’s neighbours in support of long-term regional security. Strengthening relations with Pakistan is a particular focus, he noted.

Møller also noted a need to assist the Afghan authorities with building the necessary capacity to deliver good governance. “In the longer run, Afghan institutions must be able to deliver rule of law, health, education, job creation – and security – by themselves and for themselves,” he said. This is because Afghan problems are best solved by Afghans.

All is not ‘doom and gloom’ in Afghanistan, the Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs said.

In 2001, 900,000 boys went to school; today, more than 7 million children are enrolled, 2.4 million of them are girls. Today, 90% of the population has access to basic health care, compared to an appalling 8% when the Taleban was in power. Women take part in political and economic life, and two women candidates are running for president. There is progress in establishing local development councils, which can drive development projects, and efforts to stimulate the local economies are underway. GNP per capita has risen from 182 USD in 2002 to an estimated 325 USD in 2007.

“But we cannot ignore the fact that daunting challenges remain,” Per Stig Møller said. “Afghanistan is still among the poorest countries in the world, where large numbers of the population do not enjoy the most basic necessities, such as sufficient food and clean water.

“It is a country with a conflict ridden past, reluctant to let go of its hold on Afghan society. Afghanistan is still marred by terrorism, and insecurity continues to pervade the life of many.

“In addition, Afghanistan is struggling with poor governance categorized by a lack of capacity and severe corruption. Afghanistan is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. It is also the world’s largest producer of heroin, although more than half of Afghanistan’s provinces are now opium free.”

Even more important is that we unite behind Afghan plans and priorities, otherwise we risk undermining the very national efforts that we are seeking to support, the Danish foreign minister said.

“At the end of the day, development will only be sustainable if it is based on local ownership and rooted in local institutions,” he said. “That is why non-corrupt and democratic governance and governors are so important for building trust in the Afghan state. This is the only – sustainable - way forward.”

There are no easy or quick-fix solutions for Afghanistan; instead, we have to acknowledge the need for long term commitment, Pet Stig Møller said.

The EAPC meeting in Kazakhstan provided “a window of opportunity, which we have to utilize in order to help the Afghans bring their house in order,” the Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs said. “If we allow this house to burn down, we know that the neighbouring houses will catch fire. The international community must avoid this by delivering the necessary support. And we must remain committed. A stable Afghanistan and a stable region are in the long term interest of us all. We cannot afford to fail.”

Click here to read the full address.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 1 July 2009

While the authorities believe it is necessary for society and individuals to adapt to climate change, Danes are more interested in saving energy, a new report has found.

Whereas the authorities believe it is necessary for society and individuals to adapt to climate change, for instance by protecting housing from rising water levels and greater rainfall, Danes are more interested in saving energy, according to a new report from the National Environmental Research Institute (DMU), part of Aarhus University.

Researchers around the world are sure that the climate is changing - they believe the question is about how great the changes will be, especially for the individual country or region. They see a need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to adapt to the changing climate. But Danes seem not to have understood the message, shows the report, ‘Klimatilpasning og den sociale faktor (Climate adaptation and the social factor)’.

The report addressed the social aspects of climate change adaptation, asking how people perceive and relate to climate change adaptation; what risks are associated with climate change; and how the risks are balanced with other risks and concerns of everyday life and with long-range choices.

The study was based on a distinction between climate change mitigation and adaptation and further on an assumption in adaptation policies that some adaptation measures – for economic or practical reasons – will have to be carried out by private citizens and households.

Asked directly about whether they are doing enough to protect themselves against the climate changes that are coming, people questioned had little focus on how to adapt. One person answered in terms of energy consumption, indicating she would buy AAA-labeled kitchen hardware, while another person said, ‘Some people believe that if we all become vegetarians then we’ll have solved many problems’.

The distinction between climate change mitigation and adaptation is of little significance for lay people. Moreover, the prospect of climate change does provoke reflections on social values and the need for saving energy, but when it comes to protecting one’s own life and property against future damaging effects of climate change the threat seems distant and other forms of home improvement seem more relevant.

The researchers conducting the survey were surprised by the lack of focus on how to adapt to climate change, especially when the people interviewed lived in areas with a high risk of flooding.

“It is surprising that they were not concerned about something close to their own lives, welfare and property,” said Lars Kjerulf Petersen, who headed the project. “They were more aware of the connection with energy consumption.”

Although the interviews were conducted last autumn, Petersen does not believe Danes have become more aware of the need for adaptation. The subject has not been in focus in public debates, and the results of the survey match closely other surveys conducted abroad, including in Norway.

The interviewees were also interested in small, concrete solutions that can be used immediately rather than greater changes to houses with a long-term aim of preventing climate-related damage.

Nevertheless, some adaptation measures are carried out by single households and local communities.

When households experience weather-related damages – of a kind that are expected to occur more frequently and with greater force as a result of climate changes – they take action to repair damage and prevent similar damage in the future; at least the kind of action that is easily carried out such as moving valuable goods from the basement or felling a tree. Such measures are, however, not necessarily understood in a context of climate change adaptation; they are rather specific reactions to acute problems.

To the extent that a more thorough precautionary adaptation effort is required, also by private citizens, it will have to be performed in interaction and collaboration with other actors, be it the council house caretakers, the farmers’ association or local and state authorities.

Click here to download the Danish-language report.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 30 June 2009

Relatively more immigrant entrepreneurs create jobs than ethnic Danes, but they do not manage as well as the Danes, a new study shows. Their businesses are smaller and do not grow as quickly.

Relatively more immigrant entrepreneurs create jobs than ethnic Danes, but they do not manage as well as the Danes, according to a new study released by the Danish Enterprise and Construction Authority. The immigrants’ businesses are smaller and do not grow as quickly.

The report shows that 0.49% of people with a foreign background become entrepreneurs in Denmark compared with 0.27% among ethnic Danes - and women immigrants in particular are twice as likely to become entrepreneurs as their Danish counterparts.

The authority sees a number of reasons for this development – such as a strong tradition for being an independent trader in the immigrant’s home country or difficulties in finding a job in Denmark.

Immigrant entrepreneurs typically start businesses in branches where competition is high, yields are low and investors have little interest, the authority’s report said.

Of the more than 5.5 million people who live in Denmark, about 400,000 are immigrants and 125,000 are the children of immigrants. These figures include the 245,000 immigrants and 108,000 children of immigrants from non-western countries such as Turkey and Iraq.

About 9%, or 1,450, of the 15,000 people who start a business in Denmark each year are immigrants or children of immigrants fro, non-western countries who represent 6% of the population.

“Entrepreneurs with a foreign background contribute to a dynamic entrepreneurial culture in Denmark,” said Anders Hoffmann, deputy director of the Danish Enterprise and Construction Authority, in a comment to the authority’s new report. “But the growth potential for entrepreneurs with a foreign background is far from developed as few of them have growing businesses. We need more entrepreneurs with a foreign background to think in terms of development and growth in their businesses.”

There is a great need for role models, so existing and potential entrepreneurs with a foreign background can get inspiration and advice for generating growth, the report stated. Many immigrant entrepreneurs do not make use of the advisory service of the business development system - some of which is free - and they could benefit from more education. While 56% of ethnic Danes have vocational training, only 31% of 20-34-year-old children of immigrants have such training.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 29 June 2009

The recession in the Danish economy has turned the surplus on the state’s finances to a deficit, the liberal thinktank CEPOS says in a new note. It recommends lower public spending and reforms of early retirement system and unemployment allowances.

The recession in the Danish economy has turned the surplus on the state’s finances to a deficit. According to CEPOS, the large deficit on the state’s finances has arisen because the state’s income and spending are very sensitive to economic developments, partly in the form of a pronounced easing of financial policy in both 2009 and 2010.

The deficit will increase the public debt, thereby reversing a trend since 2001 with falling public debt. The poor economic situation and public deficits will continue for some years after 2010 and will thus increase the public debt further, the thinktank says.

It adds that the public debt will be more than150 billion kroner higher in 2015 than expected in the 2015 plan for the country’s economy, and will equal 28,000 kroner per capita.

“Further easing of financial policy will simply increase the public debt and raise the need for more stringent financial policies in the future,” says the thinktank. “The economic crisis and eased financial policy thus reduce the sustainability of the public finances and make meeting the targets of the 2015 plan more difficult.”

CEPOS chief analyst Anders Borup Christensen says politicians seem not to be aware of how serious the situation is.

“Although the prospects for the state’s finances are dismal, politicians stand in line to suggest new ways of reducing public spending,” says Christensen. “But further easing of financial policy will just increase both the debt and the need for a stringent financial policy in the future. The temporary relief that increased public spending has on employment, for example, should be correlated with the increased public indebtedness and possible tax rises later.”

Christensen says the government should therefore refrain from increasing public spendiing while being ready to consolidate the public finances as economic growth increases.

“In it’s latest report, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) recommends that consollidation of the public finances should occur through lower spending rather than higher taxes, as higher taxes reduce the underlying growth in the longer term,” the CEPOS chief analyst says. “Apart from tighter control of the public service spending, politicians should restart the reform that has lain dormant for almost a year. With the prospect of a sharp deterioration in the public finances in the coming years, we cannot afford not to reform e.g. the early retirement system and daily unemployment allowances.”

Click here to read the CEPOS note in full, in Danish.

Click here to read comments in Danish by CEPOS chief analyst Anders Borup Christensen.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 24 June 2009

There will be no revolution for the present in Iran, although many people, especially young people, do not accept the results of the recent presidential election.

The repression of people in 1979 was combined with the view of the Shah as as a representative of foreign powers, but the same cannot be said about the present leaders in Iran, three observers of Iran told the Copenhagen Voice.

“The leaders today are suppressing the people but they are not sees as doing the job of a foreign power, which was very revolutionary,” said Søren Schmidt, a project researcher at the Danish Institute of International Studies’ research unit on defence and security. repression does not have that connection. This is why it will be a more murky and difficult process. It will not be good for foreign powers to intervene, if they see us as intervening it well help the mullahs will say ‘these people (those demonstrating against the regime and the election result) are associated with foreign powers’, which will not help the demonstrators. Why I say this is the beginning of the end is because a society like Iran cannot suppress the voice of the people indefinitely.”

See the Copenhagen Voice interview with Villo Sigurdsson, an immigration and integration expert in Copenhagen; Søren Schmidt; and Karin Bergquist, author of ‘Revolutionens børn - Unge i Teheran (The Children of the Revolution- Young People in Teheran)’.

See also Karin Bergquist’s column ‘Iran: The genie is out of the bottle’ here.

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 24 June 2009

Measures to encourage rejected asylum-seekers to return home had no motivational effect on those who could not be returned by force, a new report by the Danish Institute for Human Rights shows. The measures are disproportionate to their goal, they had an adverse effect on the private lives and educational opportunities of asylum-seekers, and exposed them to significant psychological pressure.

Measures introduced by the government to encourage rejected asylum-seekers and other foreigners to return to their native country had no motivational effect on those who could not be returned by force, the Danish Institute for Human Rights (DIHR) says a new report, ‘Afviste asylansøgere og andre udlændinge i udsendelsposition i Danmark (Rejected asylum-seekers and other foreigners in Denmark awaiting deportation)’.

As a result, these measures are disproportionate to the goal which they were designed to achieve, the institute adds. However, the measures had an adverse effect on the private lives and educational opportunities of asylum-seekers, as well as exposing them to significant psychological pressure.

DIHR says there has been an increasing focus on asylum-seekers in Denmark in recent years, and especially on topics such as the length of their stay in asylum centres and their mental and physical health. There has also been a great deal of public debate about the situation of rejected asylum-seekers and policies which aim to encourage them to return to their home countries.

The purpose of the DIHR study was to clarify the situation of rejected asylum-seekers and other foreigners facing deportation from Denmark and to create a databank to alleviate some of the possible adverse consequences the law has on asylum-seekers today.

The study was based on 60 qualitative interviews with rejected asylum-seekers which took place between October 2007 and February 2008, as well as interviews with staff from the Danish Red Cross, the Danish National Police, voluntary organizations and others.

In addition, DIHR reviewed selected files, logbooks from asylum centres, statistics and other relevant studies.

The study’s conclusions are based on a combination of data sources. The study focused on matters relating to housing, private and family life, economic, educational and working conditions and health.

The report also contained an analysis of the applicable international standards and principles in relation to the selected areas.

The report resulted in a number of proposals for legislative change and a number of other initiatives.

According to DIHR, there were 653 asylum-seekers facing deportation from Denmark

on 30 August 2008. The largest groups consisted of Iraqis, Iranians, Somalis, stateless Palestinians and Kosovans and the vast majority were fearful of being sent back to their homeland and did not wish to voluntarily return there. Many rejected asylum-seekers cannot be returned by force, or there are other reasons that complicate repatriation. The data also revealed that not all rejected asylum-seekers who reside in Denmark can go home, even if they so wished.

This situation helps to explain the relatively long period of residence which many asylum-seekers experience. At the end of 2006, for example, an average stay was three years and two months.

In order to accelerate the repatriation of rejected asylum-seekers and other foreigners, the Danish authorities implemented a series of measures aimed at encouraging these people to return to their native country. The measures included reducing social welfare payments, insisting that rejected asylum-seekers stay at special departure centres, and requiring them to report regularly to the police, and risk of being taken into custody.

DIHR says the study shows that these measures, which had an adverse effect on the private lives and educational opportunities of asylum-seekers, as well as exposing them to significant psychological pressure, had no motivational effect on those who could not be returned by force. As a result they are disproportionate to the goal which they were designed to achieve. This is especially true with regard to asylum-seekers who cannot be sent home because they would risk persecution, torture or other inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

The study also showed that detention in particular places a great strain on the psychological health of the detainees. Detention causes a number of significant negative consequences including mental breakdowns, suicide attempts and reduced well-being among children.

The atmosphere in asylum centres is often plagued by frustration and conflict between residents and between residents and staff. Living quarters are cramped and there is a general lack of privacy, especially for single people.

The study showed that the obligation to reside at departure centres is particularly burdensome for rejected asylum-seekers with ties outside the asylum centre especially for those with family members on the outside. In reality, some asylum-seekers spend longer or shorter periods living outside the asylum centre.

The study analysed the welfare payments which asylum seekers received.

Rejected asylum-seekers consider it difficult to live on the amounts offered, and many choose to supplement this income by working in the underground economy, often in poor conditions for very low wages.

With regard to education, the study showed that the internal courses offered by the Red Cross are limited with regard to choice, quality and the learning facilities available. Besides the Red Cross’ internal courses, rejected asylum-seekers have the opportunity to obtain training which offers recognized qualifications. Although there is a legal framework which allows asylum-seekers to gain vocational skills in this way, there are a number of barriers of an administrative, organizational and budgetary nature that mean only a small minority actually takes advantage of such training opportunities.

Over half of the rejected asylum-seekers interviewed by DIHR suffer f