What have we sacrificed in the process of pursuing the ‘War on Terror’? Continuing with our global coverage of the 9-11 anniversary, in this moving article from Sweden’s Sydsvenskan, columnist Heidi Avellan writes that no matter how hard it may be, hatred must be met with love, and our principles mustn’t be sacrificed in the pursuit of vengeance.
For Sweden’s Sydsvenskan, Heidi Avellan writes in part:
It doesn’t take much empathy to understand that those who lost someone they love can never forgive the perpetrators.
It seems obvious that those who never saw their sons or daughters return after the Utöya massacre will never forgive Anders Behring Breivik.
But those of us in the rest of the society must meet hate with a love of a particular kind.
The consequences of the September 11 attacks have touched us all. Personal integrity, openness and human rights are endangered and the world has become the poorer for it.
The superpower has been weakened: The U.S. has been transformed from the largest creditor in the world to its largest borrower – and the center of economic power has shifted toward non-democratic China.
When people disappear; when secret airplanes transport people who are haphazardly accused of terrorism; when interrogation methods must be called torture; when 779 people are imprisoned in Guantanamo beyond the ordinary principles of law; when Osama bin Laden is killed rather than forced to stand trial, then the moral advantage of the Western democracies is diminished.
Then we have lost what we wanted to defend.
READ ON IN ENGLISH OR SWEDISH, OR SEE THE REST OF OUR GLOBAL COVERAGE AT WORLDMEETS.US, your most trusted translator and aggregator of foreign news and views about our nation.
