In another move that reinforces disbanding the UN, they have appointed Zimbabwe to Chair their International Committee on Sustainable Development. Yes, you read that correctly. Kind of like appointing Mummar Khadafy as your human rights chair (oh, that's right, they already did that too)
Why do people put their faith in the UN?
Independent, UK
Dominic Lawson
It faithfully represents all that is good among the nations - and also all
that is corrupt and self-serving
Published: 15 May 2007
It has been an excellent few days for Robert Mugabe KCB, the 83-year-old
President of Zimbabwe. Not only has he celebrated the resignation of Tony
Blair, but last Saturday his environment and tourism minister, Francis
Nhema, was voted in as the leader of the UN's Commission on Sustainable
Development.
The leading article in the state-controlled Zimbabwe Herald declared: "We
totally agree with progressive Britons that Mr Blair has been a complete
disaster, whose departure was long overdue." Robert Mugabe's mouthpiece,
however, did not mention Iraq: Blair's real crime, said the Herald, was to
have been the root cause of all the "political and socioeconomic problems in
Zimbabwe ... [by] roping in his allies in the EU and the US who imposed
ruinous sanctions".
In fact, as even the author of that article will know, the few sanctions
that are in place apply only to the ability to travel of a hundred or so
leading members of Mugabe's Zanu-PF party - and those are frequently
flouted.
No, to Robert Mugabe, rather than Tony Blair, must go the distinction of
reducing the former "bread basket of Africa" to near-starvation and the life
expectancy of the average Zimbabwean from 63 to 35. Times are still good for
Mugabe's associates, however, as they sell their ever-more privileged
allocations of petrol and maize via the black market.
Mr Nhema, who was educated at Strathclyde University, in Scotland, is one of
those who also benefited from being handed a once-thriving farm expropriated
by Zanu-PF. According to recent reports, its more than 1,000 hectares are
now largely idle. Mr Nhema is also in charge of the country's national
parks, where the wildlife has been allowed to be all but be wiped out by
poachers. This is just the chap, apparently, to be nominated to run the UN's
sustainable development programme.
It was, in the way of these things, Africa's "turn" to take the chairmanship
of this UN body, and Zimbabwe's fellow African nations voted en bloc to
ensure Mr Nhema's election. The strident opposition of the EU, Canada and
the US appears to have had the entirely predictable effect of enhancing Mr
Nhema's campaign. As the Ambassador to the UN of Sudan, a regime which could
teach even Mr Mugabe a thing or two about dealing with internal opposition,
said: "This is not good: it is the right of regional groups to choose
whoever they want."
Such countries may not be great enthusiasts for democracy in their own
backyards, but at UN headquarters in New York the noble principle of "one
delegate, one vote" is rigidly adhered to. This was the system which a few
years back elected Libya to the chairmanship of the UN's Human Rights
Commission. Amnesty International could express as much outrage as it
wanted; but it could do nothing about the UN's reliably cynical way of doing
business.
Try as I might, I find it hard to feel a similar amount of outrage at the
nominations of Libya and Zimbabwe to apparently important roles at the UN.
Perhaps that is because I don't regard these commissions as much more than a
generous waste of time. There are some UN bodies -such as the various aid
agencies - which are genuinely important and which have the power to act in
a way which can change people's lives for the better; but who other than
those on it, who draw tax-free salaries and other delightful perks, really
benefits from the Commission on Sustainable Development? Leave aside the
fact that we already know what poorer countries need: access to clean water,
cheap energy, an absence of corruption and barriers to trade. What can
members of such a commission agree upon in principle, let alone in practice?
Can they even agree on what is actually meant by "sustainable development"?
On the day that Mugabe's Minister for Tourism (whose slogan is "Zimbabwe: an
African Paradise") was nominated, the UN Commission on Sustainable
Development had a meeting described as "the culmination of two years' work".
After many days of negotiation, however, it was unable to agree on a text,
let alone what to do next. The EU and Canada rejected the proposed form of
words on the grounds that it was "so weak as to be meaningless". When the
German environment minister declared that he would vote against it - "on
behalf of the world's poor" - apparently half of those present applauded.
When the minister from Pakistan, who presumably knows something about
poverty, spoke in favour, the other half of the delegates clapped. Then the
whole thing broke up. Over to you, Mr Nhema, and good luck.
One of the almost charming things about the left - in this country, at
least - is its undiminished faith in the institution of the United Nations.
In the 1930s, the British left manifested a similar idealism about the
League of Nations, an idealism which the Nazis demonstrated to be mere
naivety. Sixty years later, the massacres in Rwanda and Srebrenica - both
under the noses of UN "peacekeepers" - did little to dent faith in the UN
among the bulk of the British Labour Party and Liberal Democrats. Indeed, an
impression is sometimes given that the greatest sin of the US and Britain
over the invasion of Iraq was not that it was incompetently carried out, but
the fact that it was not approved by the UN. That, after all, was the
principled objection of those, such as Clare Short and Robin Cook, who
opposed the invasion long before its practical shortcomings became apparent.
Interestingly, however, both Short and Cook approved the Anglo American
bombardment of Serbia, despite the fact that it was not authorised by the
United Nations Security Council and was, therefore, in clear breach of
Article 53 of the UN Charter. Nonetheless, Ms Short became known as "Bomber"
Short, so enthusiastically did she back Mr Blair and that nice Mr Clinton in
this military campaign.
For the record, I shared her enthusiasm: like her, I regarded it as
intolerable that no force had been brought to bear against Slobodan
Milosevic earlier in his campaign to cleanse tracts of Greater Serbia of
"ethnic undesirables". Russia, however, would have used its Security Council
vote to veto any such international military action--as it had the legal
right to do. In this context, faith in the UN would have meant nothing more
than acquiescence in Vladimir Putin's veto.
The UN is not, as so many want to believe, the repository of all that is
virtuous and high-minded on the international stage. It is no better and no
worse than the sum of its parts, which is to say that it faithfully
represents all that is good among the nations of the world - and also all
that is corrupt and self-serving. So its election of Robert Mugabe's
henchman to a leading position is exactly what you should expect.
d.lawson@ independent.co.uk
