Short Takes: June 2002 Issue: PeaceWatch: U.S. Institute of Peace

In partnership with the Council on Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific (CSCAP), the U.S. Institute of Peace presented the workshop "Preventive Diplomacy in the Asia Pacific Region" on April 24Ð#150;28 in Hanoi. Gregory Noone, program officer in the Institute's Training Program, and George Ward, the Institute's Director of Training, led the workshop. Thirty-seven CSCAP delegates from around the Pacific Rim and 12 Vietnamese observers participated. CSCAP works closely with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Regional Forum (ARF) in promoting security cooperation in the Asia Pacific. The workshop, which built on four previous preventive diplomacy workshops that the Institute has given for CSCAP and ARF, included panel discussions, presentation of a case study in preventive diplomacy, and problem-solving exercises on negotiation and mediation.

Conflict-Management Skills Useful to Nongovernmental Organizations

Participants in the conflict-management workshop.

At the Airlie Conference Center on May 20–23, the Institute's Training Department conducted one of its semiannual workshops on the challenges facing nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Program officers Ray Caldwell and Anne Henderson taught the sessions to 30 government officials and members of humanitarian NGOs. Participants included representatives from such international groups as CARE, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and the World Food Program, as well as from local NGOs in Burundi, Cameroon, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and the United States. Workshop attendees participated in problem- solving, negotiation, and mediation exercises and heard presentations on cross-cultural communication, regional security in South Asia, and the peace process in Africa's Great Lakes region.

Project Report on Macedonian-Albanian Conflict

Brenda Pearson, senior fellow in the Institute's Jennings Randolph fellowship program, presented a project report at the Institute in May: "The Macedonian-Albanian Conflict: A Violent Peace." She provided historical background on political and military conflicts between Macedonia's ethnic Slav Macedonian majority (largely Christian) and its ethnic Albanian minority (primarily Muslim). Demanding greater economic and political power, some of the country's ethnic Albanians waged armed rebellion in March 2001 under the banner of the National Liberation Army. Even before the rebellion, many ethnic Macedonians viewed ethnic Albanians as a political and cultural threat. Because ethnic Albanians have a higher birthrate than ethnic Macedonians and recently have immigrated to Macedonia from Kosovo in large numbers, Macedonia's percentage of ethnic Macedonians is decreasing, Pearson noted.

Macedonia's First Interreligious Conference
Last summer, Macedonian president Boris Trajkovski requested that the Institute sponsor an interfaith dialogue in Macedonia. Aimed at easing tensions between Macedonia's various religious communities—especially Christian-Muslim tensions generated by Macedonia's 2001 civil war—"Confidence Building Between the Churches and Religious Communities in Macedonia Through Dialogue" took place in Skopje, Macedonia on May 10–14. The Institute and the U.S. Agency for International Development were the primary sponsors of the conference, which was organized by Paul Mojzes and Leonard Swidler of International Scholars Annual Trialogue. Approximately a hundred Christian, Muslim, and Jewish leaders and scholars participated. Among others, plenary speakers included Trajkovski; Gospodin Stephan, Archbishop of Ohrid and Macedonia; and Hafis Arif Emini, president of the Islamic Union in Macedonia.

Gospodin Stephan and David Smock

David Smock, director of the Institute's Religion and Peacemaking Initiative, reports that overt animosity between Christian and Muslim attendees decreased as the conference progressed. By the end, Christians and Muslims had found significant common ground—a shared interest in promoting religion and religious freedom in Macedonia. As a result of the conference, representatives of Macedonia's five major religious communities—Macedonian Orthodox, Muslim, Methodist, Catholic, and Jewish—agreed to form Macedonia's first Interreligious Council and hold council meetings every three months. In addition, Macedonia's Orthodox Theological University and Muslim Theological University agreed to create joint programs for the first time.

Roundtable on Justice Efforts in Sierra Leone

Neil Kritz and David Crane

In Sierra Leone, plans are moving forward to establish a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and install a concurrent special court for war crimes. As a member of a UN Group of Experts, Rule of Law Program director Neil Kritz helped to develop guidelines for the relationship between the TRC and the special court. These guidelines were incorporated into a recent UN report. At the Institute on May 13, David Crane, newly appointed prosecutor for the Sierra Leone Special Court, spoke at a roundtable moderated by Kritz and attended by a range of legal experts, veterans of international tribunals, and leaders of nongovernmental organizations. Crane shared his plans and discussed the relationship between the TRC and the special court. Former Institute fellow William Schabas participated in the roundtable; the same day, Sierra Leone president Ahmad Tejan Kabbah named Schabas one of three international commissioners on the TRC.