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                   Ortega Plan for International Security,  (OPIS) This brief article explains how the governments and peoples of our world can expedite the global peace process.  The OPIS initiative aims to further progress toward international security by recommending to all sovereign states the benefit of signing a multi-lateral, total disamament pledge. In the United States, peace is assured between its fifty states by laws prohibiting independently held state armed forces.  In other words, a state, like Connecticut, is rendered unable to wage war against another state, like New York, because the governors of each state are prohibited from raising and maintaining state militaries by federal law. The only way that peace can be assured all countries of the world is by the creation and enforcement of an international law banning national armed forces, in the same manner as how the United States bans state armed forces.  Before such total multi-national disarmament can succeed, however, all sovereign states of the world must agree to help secure, and abide by, this international law prohibiting national armed forces. This can only come about by our first securing a multi-lateral disarmament pledge from every independent nation.  Such a pledge would state that the signatory country would agree to totally disband its national armed forces under the condition that every other country of the world did likewise. Once this pledge is signed by all of the world's national governments, the process of enacting a systematic, mutually verifiable, process of disarmament may begin. The United Nations, would, of course, be the international organization the would oversee and coordinate this entire process.  U.N. representatives from each country would need to decide whether it would be wiser to also enact a law prohibiting the United Nations from maintaining an armed force, or allow a limited U.N. peace-keeping force for the purpose of ensuring that no country violate the international laws prohibiting the re-creation of national armed forces. It may take as many as ten or fifteen years for every country of the world to sign a multi-national disarmament pledge, however, there is no better way to expedite world peace.  We citizens of the world must take an active role in pursuading our governments to begin this very important process, if not for our own welfare, for that of our children.

To Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of India's Independence              THE EMBASSY OF INDIA PRESENTS:                           A  CONCERT                                 BY           Maestro USTAD ALI AKBAR KHAN - Sarod              & Pt. SWAPAN CHAUDHURY on Tabla                         Sponsored by:                     Chubb Corporation                 Saturday, August 16, 1997                       7:30 PM to 9:30 PM                                For Tickets:                ($40, $25, $15 & Students disc. available)                Call Kennedy Center Ticket Center Info:                               (202) 467-4600 At the Eisenhower Theater, John F. Kennedy Center for the  Performing Arts. Washington DC.                            ================== ********************************************** Ustad Ali Akbar Khan (North Indian Sarod P_layer_ & Raga Composer - San Francisco, California) is a master of the Sarod, a 25 string lute-like instrument, with a family musical history dating to the 16th century court of Akbar, the North Indian Mughal Emperor. He recently won the National Heritage Fellowship Award for his contribution to Indian Classical Music. He is also the founder-Director, teacher and coordinator of Ali Akbar College of Music, San Rafael, California. **********************************************