The draft of incorporation of the network of local initiatives is the result of the meeting of the Alliance of Zéralda (Algeria, December 1997), where the issue of using biological and cultural heritage for a sustained development of human community was discussed.

The network focuses on collecting and protecting local heritage and traditions which are endangered. It has set itself the task of collecting, treating and circulating the experiences for enhancing the value of natural resources and traditional knoledge linked with them such as:

• Preserving and enhancing the value of bio-diversity
• Fighting against desertification
• Management and use of water
• Management of land products

The implementation of the programme is essentially based on local and regional meetings between the different players involved in the development (local community, community organisations, university teachers, artists). The network of initiatives is open to all contributions coming from different geographical poles (Maghreb, Mediterranean, Sahel, and other regions).

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At the time when a sharp pain tares your insides
At a time when your throat is tight with anger
At a time when Algerian youth are feeling/think they are all alone
In the face of the bloody violence of the destroyers of landmarks/reference of people

At the time when you are preparing to carry her worthy son to Mother Earth
All the allies from Togo are with you in your wails, your tears and your suffering
Your battle for freedom is our battle
Your fight for non-violence is our fight
Your quest/search for respect of human dignity is our concern

Today the Artist has fallen after the journalist beside/next to the mother and her son
Blood continues to flow, blood always blood, blood everywhere
Blood which stains our dresses, our loincloths, our turbans and our faces red
Blood which shouts at the sky and talks to the Man of goodwill

At the time when the Berber singer is silenced for ever
Our hands join your hands and our breath joins your breath
Our wails and your moans soar/rise and become a new melody
The melody of the bare-handed soldiers

At the time when Héraut Kabyle is leaving us
The blood of all the allies is red
We are crying with you
The night is long but the day is not far behind

Théophile Folly AMOUZOU

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A great deal of feverishness and impatience on the eve of the meeting of Zéralda. It was like the beginning of a great adventure and yet I felt very helpless.

Faced with the situation that my country, Algeria, was experiencing, I had the impression that we couldn't do anything anymore.

At the beginning, the Alliance seemed more a utopia. Today it still continues to be so, but more like an ideal to which one aspires and which pushes you to go ahead.

As the days went by, the workshops and the evenings together, were bringing about changes in me. For the first time, during a discussion on the principle of responsibility, I felt what being responsible meant. Elsewhere, other people were meeting like us, the same concerns joined us together and the same hopes carried us forward.

I felt responsible for a small piece of the Earth, and the others with me were responsible for their part, and I said to myself that together we would make 'a large portion of the Earth'. Therein lay our strength. We couldn't change all that was wrong but together we could transform what surrounded us.

Women and men, young and the not-so-young, all the participants present had values, knowledge that I had no inkling about. That was the first step for me: to meet these treasures that I had passed by.

At the end of the century, when realism is so much in vogue, there still are actions and words which enchant us and transport us from the real to a magical world. In the course of one of the evenings one ally sang ‘Hizia’ a love song. At least for a moment I was reconciled to this sentiment which has fallen out of fashion. Another one narrated the story of the source of youth. Be it myth or reality he gave me a living proof of it.

We belonged to the same country and yet our colours, our cultures, our accents were different. It was like a journey through a country that I didn’t know.

I am looking forward to better tomorrows of peace and equity/moral justice even though our pressing concerns and our present reality allow little scope for imagination.

Mira Challal

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Kosovo for me is something terrible happening in my closest surrounding, in my country. Since the beginning of clashes in February I can't stop analyzing the situation and asking myself: "Why?" "Whom to blame?" "What to do?" "Who are the sides in this conflict?"

At one side I see Serbian regime, Serbian police and Yugoslav Army and at the other side are Albanian political parties in Kosovo and KLA. The third side is International community. And who are the victims? Citizens of Yugoslavia of course! It doesn't matter if they are Albanians or Serbs living in Kosovo, if they are young boys obliged to serve in the army or their frightened parents - they are those who really suffer!

But worse than this cognition is a feeling of helplessness. It is obvious everything is in hands of the sides mentioned above, everything depends on high politics. An ordinary citizen of this country can hardly find any role in the state's political life. He is tired of trying to express his rights, he is powerless, he is forgotten. He goes to bed with a horror tale about three sides - one misusing history spreading hatred and sacrificing young lives in order to stay in power, the other one enlarging number of victims and supporting terrorism in order to get the territory and the third one offering just statements, hopes and sometimes NATO bombs in order not to stay mute and show its real inefficiency.

This world has to be changed! For how long are we going to live oppressed by old fashionable structures? They believe human life can still be a price for some of the state needs! Are we approaching XXIst century?

T.Z.

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