Recalling the violence experienced by African's who have had limbs chopped off for years by roaming bands of violent armed men, an African writer wonders why these victims and their deaths did not count as 'terrorism' which required an international response and then asks...

The Great Debate: Are We Really Waginga War Against Terrorism?
http://allafrica.com/stories/200110220530.html

Blatu Nagbe

Call it what you may, "The rich gets richer and the poorpoorer", we are awakened by the thundering voice ofthe mighty, the rich that is, as that of the virtuallyvoiceless, the poor, ever falls on deaf ears, and isgrowing ever weaker and weaker. Yes, this first of theTwenty-First Century War is being waged againstterrorism, as the trumpet blasts, rallying all of us,letting us know that it is a "A New Kind Of War", a waragainst "Terrorism Wherever It May Be".

This sets the stage for the following parallel. Not sodistant in our immediate past as a "Global Village", wewitnessed across our television screens, how in a verylittle corner of the globe, the most recent act ofbarbarism, terrorism of a worst kind was carried out.We saw how the limbs of innocent victims in the tinycountry of Sierra Leone were hacked off by so-calledfreedom fighters. We became aware of theperpetrators and the masterminds that orchestratedthis vicious act of terrorism mainly upon "InnocentCivilians". What have we done about it so far? Answer:Nothing. No, people of the "New Village", what we allsaw on our television screens is not something out of aHitchcock Thriller Flick.

Yes, people of the "New Village", what we all saw isreal, and it did not happen during the Second WorldWar. And what did not make it to our living rooms arethe atrocities from the Mother of the Sierra Leoneanwar crimes, the Liberian Civil war crimes, where eyewitnesses saw thugs take bets on the gender of theunborn and settling the bets by splitting open thestomach of the hapless mother. Yes, it happened justyesterday, just before the dawn of this all too youngTwenty-First Century of ours! The yearning to bringthese terrorists to justice has been coming from thepoor, the weak. Thus as usual, it is coming off so faintthat we pretend not to hear it.

It took the United Nations just a matter of hours toslightly modify and evoke one of its "Self DefenseCodes" to launch this New War. It took MemberNations just a few days to rally and evoke anotherUnited Nations battle cry, "All For One, And One ForAll". Yet, for the past two years or more the sameUnited Nations has virtually given up in findingdonations from the same Member Nations for a fewmillion dollars, a mere pocket change for most of them,to set up a "War Crimes Tribunal" to help bring these"Limb Hackers" to justice on the West Coast of Africa.Let it be asked again. Are we sure we are waging awar against "Terrorism Wherever It May Be"? And fora follow-up question, are we going to sit cowardly byand apply the usual relativity to our sensitivity, whereterrorist acts are punishable in one region but enjoyimpunity in others, registering another dark chapter inour history where we allowed evil to triumph?

What we are hearing today, as we launch this NewWar, is how we have learned from mistakes made inthe past, that is, starting a job and not finishing it. Thedrive then is to make sure that all tentacles of terrorismare severed, leaving no doubt that the resulting politicaland social climate would not regenerate these sametentacles. It is a daunting but an achievableundertaking. But let's make it truly "global" for the sakeof all humanity. For the West African sub-region inparticular, what is being advocated here is not the useof "Bees and tomahawks", namely B-2's , B-52's andtheir chopping cousins. The world knows this regioncannot afford them, and if they did, they probablywould be in the wrong hands, that of the terrorists.

Therefore, what will suffice is a simple exercise ofmoral conscience, channeled in the form of thenecessary funds needed to bring to justice theseregional terrorists and their leaders at a War CrimesTribunal, leaving the same anticipated political andsocial climate that would have any chance succeedingat democracy.

For the sake of humanity, let's be true to ourconscience, as we are all in accordance with thedefinition of "terrorism" and the dangers it poses to ourvery existence, let's not repeat the mistakes of ourpast, let's not wage this war selectively. The time hascome now for "Global Village" to be accepted for itstrue meani ng.