Wait a minute, why isn't the mainstream press picking up on this one?

Former aide to United Nations Secretary General Koffi Annan, Andrew Mack, showed that over the past 12 years the world has become a significantly safer place:

  • Since the 1990's the number of armed conflicts worldwide began to drop and has continued to decline.
  • In 2003, there were 40% percent fewer conflicts than in 1992.
  • The deadliest conflicts (1,000 or more battle-deaths)? dropped 80%.
  • Between 1988 and 2001 the number of genocides (and other mass human slaughters) also dropped 80%
  • Since the mid 1990's basic human rights abuses have declined in five out of six regions of the developing world
  • International terrorism is the only type of political violence that has increased. Although the death toll has jumped sharply over the past three years, terrorists kill only a fraction of the number who die in wars.
  • Between 1990 and 2003 the dollar value of major international arms transactions fell 33%
  • Between 1992 and 2003 the number of refugees fell 45%, as more and more wars came to an end."
  • The number of actual and attempted military coups has been declining for more than 40 years.
The report attributes most of these trends to the end of the Cold War.

The only place the death toll continues to rise is in Africa where more people are being killed in wars than in the rest of the world combined. The two individual states that have experienced the greatest number of "conflict-years" since 1946 are Burma/Myanmar (232) and India (156).
Read the entire Human Security Report

For a good review of the report read Washington Post OpEd story by Andrew Mack