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 GOOD NEWS
 Humanist Press Agency
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 Issue No. 32,  december 21, 2000.

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 * H E A D L I N E S * H E A D L I N E S *
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 SCIENTIFIC ACHIEVEMENTS

 * Argentina: Ban of CFC is beginning to have a positive effect on the ozone hole.

 CULTURAL ACHIEVEMENTS

 * EE.UU.: World Report 2001.
 * WORLD: UNICEF HIV/AIDS campaign calls for abolishment of school fees and charges.

 SOCIAL ACHIEVEMENTS.

 * Europe: Amnesty International report on the European Human Rights Convention.
 * Russia: Russian farmers conceal 10-15 per cent of bigger than forecast harvest.
 * Russia: Russian organizations campaign against "sex slave" traffickers.
 * Russia: National Human Rights congress to be held in Russia in January.
 * Latvia: Anti-corruption campaign initiated.
 * Puerto Rico: Public call for immediate action on Vieques.

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 NEWS  * NEWS * NEWS  * NEWS * NEWS *
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 SCIENTIFIC ACHIEVEMENTS

 Ban of CFC is beginning to have a positive effect on the ozone hole.

 Buenos Aires, Argentina, 4 December 2000
 Good News Agency
 http://www.goodnewsagency.org

 The ozone hole will likely close within 50 years, according to scientists who
 ended on 4 December a major conference on the issue in Buenos Aires.
 The international ban on cholorofluorcarbons, which resulted from the 1987
 Montreal Protocol, is beginning to have effect, although the recovery is not
 likely to start for a few more years and will not necessarily happen steadily
 because of natural fluctuations in weather patterns.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1050000/1050495.stm
 http://www.gristmagazine.com

 CULTURAL ACHIEVEMENTS

 World Report 2001.

 Washington D.C.EE.ÛU., December 7, 2000
 Human Rights Watch
 http://www.hrw.org/wr2k1/usa/index.html

 The Human Rights Watch World Report 2001 blasts the United States for its
 trampling down of all human rights in all possible categories, essentially saying
 that the U.S. is the worst human rights offender on the planet.
 Right in the opening lines, the report ominously states that for the United States
 government at the end of the year 2000, "evidence of its domestic human rights
 legacy was scant."
 Also, as ever in world history, the United States continued to be highly reluctant
 to see itself as part of the human family, and, putting himself above others as
 something special to whom do not apply normal standards of behaviour, elementary
 ethical norms and international human rights treaties, it "made little progress in
 embracing international human rights standards."
 So, in the year 2000, most U.S. leaders "remained either unaware of their human
 rights obligations or content to ignore them."

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 UNICEF HIV/AIDS campaign calls for abolishment of school fees and charges.

 World, 6 December 2000
 UNICEF
 Good News Agency
 http://www.goodnewsagency.org

 In a bold initiative to put education at the forefront of the fight against HIV/AIDS,
 UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy on 6 December called on African
 leaders to join a global campaign to abolish all education fees and other costs
 for primary school-age children. "We live in a world where children whose families
 cannot pay for tuition, uniforms, desks, pencils, books and building repairs are
 shut out of classrooms," Bellamy said. "And yet we also live in a world that ratified
 the Convention on the Rights of the Child a decade ago, a world that recognized free
 and compulsory education as the right of every child. Governments have both a legal
 and a moral responsibility to fulfill that obligation." Noting the theme of the African
 Development Forum 2000, "HIV/AIDS: The Greatest Leadership Challenge," Bellamy
 said that educating all children requires strong leadership from African nations and the
 international community. She stressed that if just one child in a resource-poor country
 is deprived of schooling, everyone -- the state, donor nations and the family -- must be
 held accountable.
 http://www.unicef.org/newsline/00pr72.htm

 SOCIAL ACHIEVEMENTS

 Amnesty International report on the European Human Rights Convention.

 Europe, 4 November
 RFE/RL Civil Societies Report
 By: Juha Uski
 mailto:juhauski@dlc.fi

 Fifty years after its adoption on 4 November 1950, the European Convention
 on Human Rights remains an unfinished project, Amnesty International said
 in a 4 November report on the torture and ill-treatment which persists
 across Europe. In the first six months of 2000, torture and ill-treatment
 was documented by Amnesty International in at least 25 countries, 20 of
 them Council of Europe member states, including Belgium, Russia and Spain.
 "Europe is not a comfortable and secure place for all its inhabitants – in many
 countries discrimination against vulnerable groups leads to torture or
 ill-treatment. Victims include members of ethnic, racial, and religious
 minorities; immigrants; refugees and asylum-seekers; children and criminal
 suspects." Despite the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture, the political will to
 bring torturers to justice remains lacking. The full document is on the 
 Amnesty International website at:
 http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/Failure_at_Fifty.pdf

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 Russian farmers conceal 10-15 per cent of bigger than forecast harvest.

 Moscow, 16 November
 Interfax
 By: Juha Uski
 mailto:juhauski@dlc.fi

 The actual year 2000 grain harvest in Russia will exceed the official
 Agriculture Ministry forecast of 65m to 66m tonnes and will amount to 70m
 to 71m tonnes, Arkadiy Zlochevskiy, chairman of the Russian Grain Union
 board of directors and director-general of the OGO group of companies, told
 Interfax on 16th November. The higher grain harvest in 2000 will result in
 an increase in its export, while the emergency store will increase by 0.5m
 tonnes.

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 Russian organizations campaign against "sex slave" traffickers.

 Moscow, Nov 12
 The Observer (UK)
 By: Juha Uski
 mailto:juhauski@dlc.fi

 Early November, 43 anti-trafficking organisations from 25 regions of Russia
 and six former Soviet republics held a conference to start tackling the
 problem of trade in women.
 The usual pattern is that women are told lies about good life and job in
 the West and when they get there they are imprisoned and forced to work as
 prostitutes. According to the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in
 Europe this phenomenon has swept up something like 500,000 Russian women in
 the past decade (although the trade's clandestine nature makes it
 impossible to estimate accurately the numbers). Activists say that, despite
 its scale, human trafficking is still not treated seriously by the Russian
 government.
 The main conclusion to come out of this month's anti-trafficking conference
 was the need for greater information. A privately sponsored advertising
 campaign showing pretty young fish being ensnared by evil fishermen is soon
 to run on regional television, and lectures in schools are being organised
 to warn girls to be wary of offers of casual labour abroad.

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 National Human Rights congress to be held in Russia in January.

 Moscow, 20 Nov
 Interfax
 By: Juha Uski
 mailto:juhauski@dlc.fi

 Russian rights champions are planning a national congress in Moscow on
 January 20-21. The congress organizing committee includes parliamentary
 deputy Sergei Kovalyov, Glasnost Foundation head Sergei Grigoryants, and
 Lev Ponomaryov, leader of the For Human Rights Party.
 The committee says that the key goals of the congress are to "influence
 public mentality in order to avert the establishment of an authoritarian
 regime, discuss problems of the rights defense community and help
 consolidate civic society."

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 Anti-corruption campaign initiated.

 "RFE/RL Newsline," 30 November
 By: Juha Uski
 mailto:juhauski@dlc.fi

 Latvian Prime Minister Andris Berzins on 29 November announced the beginning of the
 country's largest-ever campaign to inform the community about the problem of corruption
 and the means to fight it, BNS reported. The campaign--which is financed by the PHARE
 anti-corruption legislation, education, and public information program, the Latvian government,
 and other institutions--will last until July 2001. It will include the publication of various booklets
 and the production of television programs to explain what corruption is and how to combat it.
 Stressing that any anti-corruption efforts will be in vain without public support, the organizers
 of the campaign said efforts will focus on informing and educating young people as well as
 journalists. Berzins noted that "there is no way to eliminate corruption in the twinkling of an eye,
 but it is possible to keep making consistent steps toward curbing it.

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 Public call for immediate action on Vieques.

 Vieques, Puerto Rico, 9 December, 2000
 Committee for the Rescue and Development of Vieques.
 Vicente Rodriguez Nietzsche
 mailto:guajana@coqui.net
 By: Jesnus Sordo

 The movement to achieve peace in Vieques has garnered wide national and
 international support. This movement has existed for decades, but gained
 widespread consensus following the death of David Sanes Rodriguez, who
 was killed by a U.S. Navy bomb in Vieques on April 19, 1999.
 The time is now. In order to achieve this, the people of Vieques are
 calling on all the politicians and leaders who have promised in the past to
 intervene  and intercede with the White House to ACT NOW.

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 GOOD NEWS
 Humanist Press Agency
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 Publishes only news about social, scientific and cultural achievements and
 progress of humanity.

 Issue No. 32, december 21, 2000.

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