International affairs

Goldstone serves on South Africa's Constitutional Court. From 1991-1994, he headed the Commission of Inquiry regarding public violence and intimidation, otherwise known as the Goldstone Commission. More recently, he was Chief Prosecutor of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. This month he'll be lecturing at a conference at the University of California at Berkeley.

Writer Michael Ignatieff's article "Unarmed Warriors" appears in the March 24, 1997 issue of The New Yorker. He writes about the International Committee of the Red Cross, and the increased dangers that workers have been exposed to, although they are considered neutral and carry no weapons. In Rwanda in 1994, 36 workers were killed in the war, and in Chechnya last December, six staff members were murdered.

Saul Friedlander is the author of "Nazi Germany and the Jews, Vol. 1: The Years of Persecution 1933-1939." He examines the period looking at how Hitler's "murderous rage" and ideologies, converged with internal political pressures, and attitudes of German and European societies to create the Holocaust. Friedlander was born in Prague and was seven when his parents hid him in a Catholic seminary in France where he took on a new identity. His parents died in the Holocaust. Friedland now teaches at Tel Aviv University and at UCLA.

Daniel Jonah Goldhagen is the author of the controversial book "Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust." He offers evidence that ordinary Germans knowingly cooperated in the Holocaust, that they were motivated by anti-Semitism, not by economic hardship, coercion, or psychological pressures, as usually put forth by historians. Goldhagen is Associate Professor of Government and Social Studies at Harvard University.

Journalist Stan Sesser is a former staff writer for the New Yorker and the senior fellow of the Human Rights Center at the University of California at Berkeley. He's been following the imminent takeover of the British-ruled Hong Kong by the Chinese government. He says while Hong Kong will most likely preserve its economic freedom, the July 1 takeover calls into question the future of its democratic government and civil-liberties laws.

New York Times Reporter John F. Burns. He has followed the latest events of Afghanistan's 18-year-old civil war, concentrating on the rise to power of the Taliban, an Islamic religious movement. Burns examines the Taliban's effect on the war-torn country's laws and punishment, including stoning, amputations, and executions.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reporter recently traveled across the Himalayan Mountains with a group of Buddhist monks and nuns who were fleeing from persecution by the Communist Chinese government in Tibet. Some of them had been imprisoned and tortured by the Chinese. If caught, they would be sent back to prison and tortured. During their 14-day trek they experienced frost-bite, snow blindness, oxygen-thin air, pain, and hunger.

This past spring in Philadelphia, in a well publicized match, Kasparov beat IBM's Deep Blue, which was considered the most competitive chess computer to date. Kasparov recently has been promoting chess as a learning tool in schools. He made a new chess computer game called "Talking Coach Kasparov" by Saitek. It has the unique feature of having an electronic chess tutor talk to you when you're in trouble. Kasparov was born in Moscow and was an outspoken critic of communism during the Cold War.

Guest host Marty Moss-Coane speaks with two experts about the refugee crisis in Rwanda and Zaire. Chris Cushing is Regional Emergency Coordinator for Care International in Zaire. Journalist Philip Gourevitch is based in Rwanda. He writes frequently on the region for The New Yorker and is currently working on a book about Rwanda and the aftermath of the 1994 civil war.

The Australian-born activist helped found and was the first president of the Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) and the Women's Action for Nuclear Disarmament (WAND). Her new autobiography "A Desperate Passion" is about her life, activism, and the effect of notoriety on her personal life. In 1985 PSR's umbrella affiliate, the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, received the Nobel Peace Prize.