The Guardian (Lagos)
1 October 2001
Lagos — Rather than embarking on a revenge mission, the United States (U.S.) has been advised to deplore its resources in conjunction with the international community to track down and prosecute those behind the September 11 suicide bombing of its two major cities, New York and Washington.
Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka while admitting that the U.S. had the right to strike against the terrorists, however, said the response to the crime against humanity transcends an American affair as the culprits can be handled better by an international court.
"I understand how Americans feel now, and they certainly have the primary right to respond. But if we are moving towards a global order, the response to crimes such as this must be placed in a global context, not jus an American one" the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) quoted Soyinka as saying in an interview published in the Sunday Times in Johannesburg.
Soyinka said he believed the culprits of the attacks on the U. S. should be captured and tried for crimes against mankind before the international court.
"This will galvanize the entire civilized world and spread the burden and responsibility to all nations of bringing the culprits to justice, no matter how long it takes."
"If we accept the legitimacy of the UN tribunal convened in the Hague to try (Slobodan) Milosevic for crimes against humanity, mustn't we also accept that those who committed these crimes against humanity also be tried in the same way?", Soyinka asked, adding that if America goes it alone, the message to the world would be that it wanted vengeance not justice.
The Nobel Laureate said the whole world was appalled by the sheer dimension of the destruction in lower Manhattan and pointed out that the earlier attacks on U. S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania was an outrage that was directed against Africans.
"American were killed there too. But these attacks took place on African soil and mostly Africans were victims," Soyinka added.
He added that when he warned earlier of the dangers of religious fanaticism in the 21st century, he was thinking of "that streak of fundamentalist insanity that runs through all religions - Christian, Jewish, Moslem, Hindu alike."
"I find these fanatics no different from eluded individuals who carried out the atrocities in New York and Washington in the conviction they would go to paradise", said Soyinka, who observed that the crimes committed by these people only varied in their magnitude.
He described the fundamentalists as "stratum of the population who believes religious passion must wipe out all consideration for the rest humanity" and that they have the God-given right to judge and destroy.
"This mindlessness, and that is what it is, is a very dangerous failing of humanity, and it threatens us all, he said.
Soyinka stressed that the September 11 suicide attack was not an attack on Americans alone. "It is a crime against humanity; a crime against the right of a civilized existence; a very dangerous slap in the face of the world", he added.
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