TEDxOslo - Sturla Ellingvåg - Democracy -what next? June 21, 2011

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Sturla Ellingvåg is an economist and historian, Chapter Chair of the Explorers Club in Scandinavia and founder of the historical research foundation Explico.

In 2011 he successfully initiated a 18 day long boycott against the Coca-Cola Company through social medias, especially on Facebook, based on massive public support in the Martine Vik Magnussen case. The boycott by tens of thousands in Europe, America and the Middle East targeted Coca-Cola for their involvement with Yemeni violator of human rights, Shaher Abdulhak, who is sheltering his son from prosecution of rape and murder of the Norwegian girl Martine Vik Magnussen in London in 2007. Yemeni freedom fighters target Shaher Abdoulhak for being part of the horrible regime which has been murdering and injuring thousands of nonviolent demonstrators seeking democracy and human rights.

This experience lead Sturla straight into the middle of the Yemen revolution and to the recently founded Global Movement for Human Rights. The foundation is a unique alliance between supporters of Freedom, Democracy, Human Rights and Ethics in the Muslim world and in the West, standing side by side with Multinational Corporations in a mutual fight for the promotion of these values to exist universally, through international law and also above national borders. The combination of Middle Eastern freedom fighters and devoted ethics and human rights defenders in the West is a killer combo. Nonviolent action and dialogue based confrontations are the key ingredients.

Sturla believes the future of democracy is at stake if we do not act by taking individual and corporate responsibility.

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