eni-summary list Ecumenical News International News Highlights 29 August 2003

Peru’s truth commission praises and criticises role of churches

Lima (ENI). A government-appointed truth and reconciliation commission, which found that more than 69 000 people had died or disappeared in Peru between 1980 and 2000, has both praised and criticised the role of churches during that violent period. The death toll cited in the report is more than twice original estimates, based on 17 000 testimonies gathered throughout Peru seeking to shed light on human rights violations committed after the Shining Path rebel group launched a national insurgency in Peru’s Andean highland province of Ayacucho in 1980. [590 words, ENI-03-0453]

Zimbabwe church alliance applauds UN stand on food distribution

Harare (ENI). An alliance of church groups in Zimbabwe has applauded the stand taken by the United Nations’ World Food Programme to suspend food aid to Zimbabwe if the government insists on taking over distribution from the donor organizations. And in an apparent about-turn, the government has verbally agreed to allow the WFP to continue distributing food aid to needy communities in Zimbabwe, the UN coordinator in Zimbabwe, Victor Angelo told the UN Integrated Regional Information Networks. [404 words, ENI-03-0455]

Africa likely to be centre of Christianity says incoming WCC leader

Geneva (ENI). Africa is likely to be “the centre of Christianity in terms of numbers” in the 21st century, the newly elected World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary the Rev Sam Kobia has said. Kobia, a Kenyan Methodist will be the first African to head the 55-year-old ecumenical organization and was elected at the 53rd meeting of the WCC main governing body, its central committee. [516 words, ENI-03-0456]

US to be focus of World Council of Churches anti-violence campaign

Geneva (ENI). The United States is to be the focus of an ecumenical church campaign against violence, the main governing body of the World Council of Churches has decided. The WCC’s central committee has approved the US as the focus of its Decade to Overcome Violence campaign for the year 2004. Its choice moves the focus from war-torn places such as the Middle East (the focus in 2001) and Sudan (the 2003 focus) to the nation viewed as the world’s only super power. [668 words, ENI-03-0452]

Exhibition aims at healing the ‘scars of memory’ in Rwanda

Geneva (ENI). Art is a universal language that can inspire people to overcome the evil of which human beings are capable, says Kofi Setordji, who has created a striking exhibition dealing with the genocide in Rwanda that happened almost 10 years ago. In 1994, Setordji, a sculptor from Ghana, saw television pictures of the violence in Rwanda in which about 800 000 people lost their lives in the space of 100 days, as extremists from the ethnic Hutu majority murdered Tutsis and Hutu moderates. “I was moved as a human being seeing other human beings being killed,” he recalls. “My goal is to stop the evil.” [551 words, ENI-03-0454]

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