Peaceful Indebtedness

A truly inspiring bit of news came across the wire a few days ago and its political significance should not go unnoticed. Muhammad Yunus, recent winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, wants to help the people of North Korea. He wants to take his winning economic strategy known as the microcredit program and introduce it to the poor. [According to Reuters, his Grameen Bank says it has loaned nearly $6 billion to 6.6 million people and has a recovery rate of nearly 99 percent.]

Now considering all the rhetoric about North Korea’s nuclear test and the so-called threat to the world, how radical is it when one man points the finger at the real problem and proposes a simple solution?

Yunus has outdone himself and offered a beautiful idea.

Said Yunus, "If they would like to have a microcredit program, I would like to have a banking program. The leadership is the not the whole of a nation.” Ain’t it the truth. North Korea, like so many nations in the world, doesn’t have the leadership its people deserve. Yunus continues, "If Beijing can take it as a political decision and adopt it as an official policy of the Communist Party of China, I don't see North Koreans would have any problem". Well, comparing modern China, a country with an interest in North Korea’s natural resources, with North Korea’s ruling elite seems a bit naive but at least he’s on the right path.

Yunus’s most interesting comment was "poverty is a very important aspect of peace". He’s correct: the elite class still believes that might is right; that the strong will always rise to the top. Which reminds me of what Jesus said “the weak shall inherit the earth”.

It’s nice to know that at least one prize winner is thinking outside the political box.

That’s just my opinion. I could be wrong.