The German press too is busily analysing developments regarding the atomic experiments in North Korea. Writing in Die Welt, Torsten Krauel (12/10) points out: “… It’s not a question of imposing a UN ceasefire on an aggressor. It’s a grey zone in the legislation of the UNO, that of how to define the hitherto unregulated consequences of violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty… It would be problematic to justify a military threat, as in the case of Saddam, by a violation of the UN ceasefire” . In the Frankfurter Rundschau (10/10), Harald Maas comments: “The only way of dealing with the regime is diplomacy. The international community must react to Kim’s provocation by adopting a twin-track approach: maximum pressure and amenability at the political level. The pressure must be exerted by the States that have hitherto most supported the regime: China and South Korea. These countries are the only ones that can really exert economic influence on Pjongjang. Seoul must suspend the aid with which it has hitherto supported the North. The economic influence of China is even greater… If Beijing, which traditionally considers itself the protector of North Korea, were to close its borders with North Korea, it would deal a blow on the regime. But the real solution of the conflict lies in Washington. The USA must begin direct negotiations with Kim Jong Il, with the aim of political rapprochement” . And writing in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (12/10), Petra Kolonko comments: “With its harsh condemnation and promised support for UN sanctions, the People’s Republic [of China] is taking the side of the critics of Pjongjang…. What’s at stake for China in this crisis is greater than for other permanent members of the Security Council. Beijing must jettison the old doctrine of Chinese foreign policy, according to which sanctions ought not to be instruments of international policy. A decision in this sense in the case of North Korea represents a precedent that could imply China’s adoption of a different position also on other cases, e.g. Iran. In this way, China would jeopardize friendships that she had consolidated at the international level precisely thanks to this attitude. Hitherto the friends of China in Africa and in the Middle East could be certain that Beijing would not join in international condemnation or would even prevent it”. The British and French press devotes wide coverage to the assassination of the Russian investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaia. “At times people have paid with their own life for having expressed loudly and clearly what they think”: a tribute to the journalist in the British daily THE GUARDIAN (9/10) cites words used by Politkovskaia herself in a recent press conference. In March the paper had published an article she had written on chemical pollution in the region of Shelkovsk. “One of the most brilliant Russian journalists was assassinated last Saturday – says an editorial in the paper – who, more than any other of her colleagues, had challenged both the Russian State and the Chechen rebels”. Conscious “ of the risk she ran, and urged to leave Moscow, she decided to remain there. A courage that cost Anna Politkovskaia her life. Now Putin must show himself equally courageous in hunting down her assassins”. The following headlines were used by the French daily LE MONDE (11/1) in publishing a reportage written by the murdered journalist on Chechnya: “The Putin question” and “Russia barbarized”. “The assassination of Anna Politkovskaia – says the editorial – cannot be imputed to the regime, but is the expression of a climate of violence, absence of rule of law and intolerance for which ” the Putin government “ has a large share of blame”. After the killing of the journalist, “a crime in which everything indicates the wish to eliminate a voice that was causing irritation, the message that Anna strove to spread assumes even greater force” : it is that of “ a Russia in which the brutal methods of war conducted for seven years in the Caucasus, in the name of the fight against international terrorism, ended up spreading throughout society”. The words used by Benedict XVI during the general audience on Wednesday 11 October, aimed at underlining the importance of the truth and the conservation of one’s own identity in the dialogue between religions and cultures, are commented on in an editorial in the Italian Catholic daily AVVENIRE (12/10). “Today – observes Davide Rondoni – a kind of minuet, a desultory chat between complacent people, without love for the truth, is often called dialogue”. According to the journalist, however, “dialogue cannot but inflame passion and rigour if there’s interest for the truth, i.e. if there is really a wish for people to unite. Whoever supports falsehood, and blathers about unity, in reality favours division”. “Against the false practice of dialogue there is a narcosis of consciences that serves only the interests of those who want to control power without any inconvenience to themselves”. In his exhortation, on the contrary, the Pope insists on the need to “preserve the identity of our faith”. It’s “a question not of bravura in cultural dialectic, but of life”.
