A strange juxtaposition

Isn't this a strange juxtaposition of news stories? It was on the World News page of the Daily Telegraph (UK) online edition.

So on the one hand, the UN is very aggrieved that the US state of Texas would proceed with the execution of a Mexican national without taking into account that he did not have consular assistance at trial. The US Supreme Court denied a last-minute stay because US law does not recognize the lack of consular assistance as the basis for a Federal appeal.

Not that this was anything other than a stalling tactic. The condemned killer, Humberto Leal, tortured and murdered a 16-year-old girl: the physical evidence conclusively disproved his version of the events.

At the same time that the UN is deploring the execution of a particularly vicious rapist-murderer, its "peacekeeping" mission in Sudan stood idly by as Sudanese government forces attacked and murdered civilians:

Hundreds of people gathered outside a UN base for safety after Sudan's armed forces moved to crush a fresh rebellion by opposition militia in the town of Kadugli in the country's southeast.

They were refused entry to the fortified compound and instead camped outside its barbed wire perimeter with little shelter, food or water.

Reverend Barnaba Ibrahim said soldiers arrived in the middle of the night and dragged men accused of being rebel sympathisers away to be killed.

The allegations, supported by other reports from the area, again call into question the ability of the £650 million-a-year UN mission in Sudan to fulfil its mandate to protect civilians.

"I was just hiding, lying down pretending to be asleep, and they took the man next to me and beat him to death with sticks, five metres from the walls of the UN base," Rev Ibrahim said in Juba, capital of South Sudan, where he has fled for safety.

"Two other men were taken the same night. They were screaming and protesting.

The next day, we found their bodies nearby and they had been shot." Rev Barnaba, an Anglican pastor from Kadugli, said that "there is no way the peacekeepers did not know what was happening".

"There are armed guards all around that place, even at night," he said, still wearing the white shirt and grey slacks he fled in, a month ago.

"The peacekeepers are supposed to be there to protect us. They did nothing. This happened more than the one time I witnessed." Anderson Yacoub, who works with the Anglican diocese of Kadugli, said colleagues sleeping outside the same UN base, at Shaahir on the city's outskirts, had reported similar stories.

"There were other people who fled into the mountains, even though that seemed more dangerous, and they survived," he said, also in Juba.

"Those others who went seeking refuge at the UN, they were the ones who died." The United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) has been plagued by allegations that it has repeatedly failed to carry out its central mandate to protect civilians, by force if necessary.

The UN protests that an American state executes a brutal killer, while the force it deploys with the mandate to stop brutal killers from brutally killing civilians simply stands by as those brutal killer brutally kill civilians. It seems to me that the UN as an organization is culpable in the deaths of the Sudanese who believed its promises of safety and protection, especially since those people flocked to the UN compound precisely because of those promises and were thus nicely arranged in a compact group for the murderers to slaughter.

And note that the UN donor countries pay $1 billion a year to have UN peacekeepers sit on their thumbs and watch civilians be murdered. I would rather have my taxes go to the costs of executing more Humberto Leals rather than to subsidizing the incompetence and cowardice of so-called "peacekeepers" whose presence actually facilitates the killing they were sent to prevent.

Push hard enough, and the truth will emerge

The Arab and Muslim nations of the world have been working diligently to get the United Nations to craft an agreement whereby it would be a "crime" to disrespect or insult a religion. Guess what nation is throwing up a roadblock to the proposal?

Nope. Saudi Arabia. Turns out that they're worried that the proposal would protect religions other than Islam:

The Saudi Arabian parliament on Monday rejected a recommendation to adopt an international agreement that forbids insulting religions, prophets and clerics, the Saudi daily Al-Watan reported.

Seventy-seven members of parliament rejected the recommendation, claiming that if they adopted the agreement, they would have had to recognize the legitimacy of idolatrous religions, such as Buddhism.

The recommendation was put forward by MP Muhammad Al-Quweiha's. He wrote that the Saudi Foreign Ministry should cooperate with the Arab and Islamic bloc in the United Nations to adopt the agreement.

"The concept of religions varies from one country to the other and from one culture to the other. Buddhism and Bahaism are considered religions in some countries, but must Muslims respect these sects and not condemn them," said MP Khalil Al-Khalil, who rejected the recommendation.

Al-Quweiha explained that his incentive was to prevent the ongoing campaign of insulting Islam and Prophet Muhammad, in particular the cartoons and films which are shown in the US and Holland.

A member of the Saudi Shoura Council who voted against the resolution told The Media Line the question of whether it implied recognition of other religions was not the issue.

"To me, this resolution is in conflict with main principles like human rights, freedom of speech and freedom of opinion," he said.

Two years ago, the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC), which Saudi Arabia is a member of, submitted a five-point action plan to the European Union, regarding the controversy over the anti-Muhammad cartoons. The plan included legislation by the European Parliament against the anti-Islam phenomenon in the West and exerting joint efforts by both the EU and the OIC to issue a UN resolution forbidding offenses against religions and prophets.

Look at it this way: you can believe that the Saudis are champions of human rights, freedom of speech and freedom of opinion when they allow a Gay Pride Day parade to march from a church in Medina to a synagogue in Mecca, and not a second sooner.

More evidence of UN uselessness

Proffered without comment:

UN peacekeepers ambushed in Darfur barely a week after launching mission

Bomb wounds 2 UN peacekeepers on patrol south of Beirut

Status quo won't change after Katyusha': 2 rockets hit North; Barak to "assess situation before responding;" UNIFIL to 'Post': No suspect ruled out.

UN Security Council: Killing civilians is bad

Wow. Who knew?

UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- The U.N. Security Council called Tuesday on forces in Afghanistan to take all possible precautions to avoid civilians deaths and urged foreign troops to enhance their understanding of local culture by cooperating with Afghan authorities.

The council also condemned Taliban and al-Qaida insurgents for killing innocent Afghans in suicide bombings and using civilians as "human shields." The statement came a week after a suicide attack killed 17 people, including 12 children, in a crowded market in southern Afghanistan.

"The Security Council expresses its concern about all civilian casualties and reiterates its call for all feasible steps to be taken to ensure the protection of civilian life," the 15-member council said in a statement adopted by consensus after closed consultations.

How about if NATO forces annihilate the Taliban and al-Qaeda? There may be some civilian casualties as a consequence of those operations, but the end result will be the cessation of murders by the extremists and no more need for NATO operations.

Sudanese president unclear on the concept

The concept of the carrot and the stick, that is.

Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir on Saturday condemned the United States for pursuing sanctions against his country over Darfur, the BBC quoted Sudan TV as reporting.

"We are amazed why USA is continuing with sanctions after a time when we agreed with the U.N. on the heavy support package," he said.

Why? Because agreeing is not the same as following through.

Sudan agreed on June 12 to a combined United Nations and African Union peacekeeping force of more than 20,000 troops and police, but many diplomats doubt Khartoum will keep its word.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice this week accused the Khartoum government of repeatedly breaking its promises to end the violence in the remote western region of Darfur.

Rice also said Sudan must face "consequences" -- code for new U.N. sanctions -- if it failed to allow the force in.

"Will these sanctions return the displaced and refugees to their villages? Will these sanctions help in providing services to the people?" Bashir asked during a live media conference.

How about, you let the displaced and refugees return to their villages and stop slaughtering them, Mr. President, and then you won't have to worry about the sanctions?

UN, meet the UN

Gen. Graziano, commander of UNIFIL forces in Southern Lebanon, gave the Jerusalem Post a robust assessment of security in his sphere of operations -- just a few days before six of his troops were blown to smithereens by a roadside bomb.

'In my area of operations there is no open hostile activity, and we also do not see a rearmament happening,' he said. 'We are physically patrolling every corner of southern Lebanon, and if there were a bunker [system], we would have found it.'

Someone at the UN should talk to someone at the UN:

Security along the Lebanon-Syria border is insufficient to prevent arms smuggling and Lebanon should quickly establish a mobile force to intercept any flow of weapons, a UN-appointed team said in a report obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press.

The 46-page "Report of the Lebanon Independent Border Assessment Team" said management of the border is currently shared by four different Lebanese security agencies that do not coordinate operations or planning, and do not share intelligence.

In addition, it said, most of Lebanon's border posts are far from the border, are not fenced or secured by gates, and operate with no obvious procedures to determine which goods to inspect - and which people to question.

"Therefore, the ingenious smuggler may find it quite easy to conceal not only explosives, light weapons and ammunition, but also assembled and unassembled heavy weaponry, such as missiles and rockets into the country concealed in compartments and panels of cargo trucks and passenger vehicles," the team said.

Unless and until Gen. Graziano fulfills his mandate to stop weapons from flowing into Southern Lebanon, he's going to preside over quite a few more funeral ceremonies for his men.

Another backwards news story

Non-news from Iran about their latest stalling tactic:

Iran is ready to provide answers on past suspicious nuclear activities to the International Atomic Energy Agency within the next few months, the agency's head said Friday after meeting with the country's top nuclear negotiator.

But the Iranian official suggested the offer was conditional to an end of U.N. Security Council involvement in Iran's nuclear program. The council has already imposed two sets of sanctions on the Islamic republic over the past half year for its refusal to freeze uranium enrichment and is poised to impose new penalties.

Why can't we see a news story like this?

Coalition forces are ready to cease bombing sorties against Iranian military and nuclear development facilities within the next few months, the U.N. Secretary-General said Friday after meeting with the country's top nuclear negotiator.

But the U.N. official suggested the offer of a cease-fire was conditional to the end of the Iranian nuclear program. The Islamic Republic has already escalated its nuclear program many times in response to the U.N. Security Council's sanctions for that program and says it is ready to rebuild its program when the bombing stops.

It would be refreshing, to say the least.

Time to shatter the centrifuges

Iran says it has enough uranium in a form enriched enough to be within months of building a "Little Boy" bomb.

Iran claimed today to have stockpiled 100kg of enriched uranium, enough in theory to create two nuclear bombs of the kind that destroyed Hiroshima.



A war exhibition held in Iran in 2005

The news will once again stoke fears that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's regime is seeking to build a nuclear weapon.

Iran would need 50kg of weapons-grade uranium in order to make one nuclear weapon equal in power to the one dropped by the Americans in 1945.

So far, the regime’s uranium has only been enriched to the level needed for generating electricity in civilian nuclear power stations.

But if Iran chooses to enrich it to 84 per cent purity, it would reach weapons-grade level and become the essential material for building a bomb.

The United States possesses conventional bombs, MOABs, that can cause massive concussion. By creating a large artificial earthquake in Natanz, it should be possible to vibrate the centrifuges there enough to send them off-balance and cause them to shatter from their own momentum. Israel might be able to do the job with more conventional bombs, but I would rather see 18,700 pounds of high explosive in one fell swoop rather than nine 2,000-pound explosions in series.

UPDATE:

Hey! No take-backs!

Iran's Interior Ministry denied a report Friday quoting the minister as saying Iran has produced 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of enriched uranium. The ministry said he was misquoted.

The semiofficial ISNA news agency reported that the minister, Mostafa Pourmohammadi, also said Iran now has 3,000 hooked-up centrifuges actively enriching uranium.

The Interior Ministry later issued a statement denying Pourmohammadi made the comments reported by ISNA. The minister "only spoke about Iran's nuclear achievements and he did not mention amount of enriched uranium and the number of installed centrifuges," said the statement, carried on the Web site of the state broadcasting company. "The recently published report is denied."

Is this the old bluff-and-deny strategy? Probably not -- sounds more like the old I-showed-my-hand-too-soon blunder.

They can't be that hard to recognize

The Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Prof. John Dugard, issued the following statement on May 29, 2007:

Peace and respect for human rights cannot be brought to the region unless the international community intervenes to persuade, and if necessary, to compel both Israelis and Palestinians to seriously address the issues that stand in the way of an independent Palestinian state. The Quartet is the body chosen by the Security Council of the United Nations for this task. It cannot achieve anything unless it approaches both parties in a fair and even-handed manner. This requires it to treat both parties equally and to accord equal recognition and standing to both parties. The full recognition of the Palestinian Government of National Unity is therefore an indispensable requirement to further peace. This means the recognition of both Hamas and non-Hamas members of the Palestinian Government of National Unity. In order to prevent another season of violence and to protect human rights in the region, the Quartet must intervene immediately in a fair and even-handed manner.

I couldn't agree more. And to help the Quartet recognize Hamas for what it is and what it intends, here's a helpful hint from its supreme leader, Khaled Mashaal:

Khaled Mashal, the influential political leader of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, insists attacks on Israel will continue despite overwhelming Israeli retaliation that has cost scores of lives in the Gaza Strip in the past two weeks.

Speaking in Damascus yesterday he asserted it was the right of the Palestinians to resist "Zionist aggression" regardless of whether their actions were effective.

The continuing siege of the Palestinians would lead to an explosion that would affect the entire Middle East, he predicted.

"Under occupation people don't ask whether their means are effective in hurting the enemy," he told the Guardian in a rare interview at his heavily guarded offices, plastered with images of Jerusalem and "martyrs" killed by the Israelis.

"The occupiers always have the means to hurt the people they control. The Palestinians have only modest means, so they defend themselves however they can."

Good luck with that "persuasion and compulsion" thing, Prof. Dugard:

Problems have been compounded by the siege imposed on the Palestinian Authority by the US and EU after Hamas won democratic elections in 2005, Mr Mashal said.

"The siege is collective punishment, and a crime. And the crime is even worse after the Mecca agreement because Palestinians had expected the siege would be lifted.

"Now the international community is trying to undermine Hamas. That will lead to an explosion that will be in the face of the Israeli occupation. The damage will affect the stability of the entire region."

Mr Mashal rejected demands by the Quartet (the US, the EU, the UN and Russia) that Hamas accept three conditions - recognition of Israel, an end to violence and acceptance of previous peace agreements with Israel. These terms had been accepted by Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas, the Fatah leader and president of the Palestinian Authority, but that had not forced Israel to withdraw.

It was the Palestinians who needed recognition, not Israel, he said. It was a "pretext" to demand the amendment of the Hamas Charter, which says: "Israel will ... remain until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated its predecessors." The charter calls the whole of Palestine an Islamic trust which cannot be given away to non-Muslims.

"What caused Sharon to leave Gaza, Barak to leave Lebanon in 2000? And look what's going on in Iraq where the greatest power in the world is facing confusion because of Iraqi resistance. Time is on the side of the Palestinian people. We are right, and our cause is just, despite the appeasement of Israel by most powerful members of the international community."

On the other hand, compare the statements of Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, who doesn't live under Syrian protection in Damascus but rather under Israeli pressure in Gaza:

In another development, Abbas met in Gaza City on Wednesday with Ismail Haniyeh and discussed with him the possibility of declaring a unilateral truce with Israel. The two also discussed ways of defusing tensions between Fatah and Hamas and preventing the collapse of the Hamas-led unity government.

This was Haniyeh's first appearance in public after reports that Israel was planning to liquidate Hamas leaders in response to the continued rocket attacks on Israel. Earlier this week Haniyeh stayed away from the weekly meeting of his cabinet out of fear for his life. A previous meeting between Abbas and Haniyeh was held at an undisclosed location and journalists were not invited for "security reasons."

Also Wednesday, Haniyeh met with members of the Egyptian security delegation who are based in the Gaza Strip. They discussed the proposed truce with Israel and the situation inside the Gaza Strip.

Haniyeh said after the meeting that his government was close to announcing a series of security measures to impose law and order in the Gaza Strip. He added that the measures include the appointment of new security commanders in the Gaza Strip.

Asked about the possibility of halting the Kassam rocket attacks, Haniyeh said: "We support a simultaneous, mutual and comprehensive cease-fire to protect the interests of the Palestinian people. The ball is now in the Israeli court."

By the way, it's pretty clear that Hamas recognizes Fatah, too:

The Hamas official, Said Siyam, also blamed "outside forces" of arming Fatah units, including the influential Presidential Guard, and of training its members to fight Hamas. He did not elaborate.

"They want to strengthen the presidential guard and the militias at the expense of Hamas ... They want to obliterate Hamas," said Siyam, a former Hamas interior minister.

Well, they say it takes one to know one.