A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary
Chrenkoff: "United Nations World Food Program reports that "a total of 19,196 mt of commodities (including High Energy Biscuits, wheat flour, vegetable oil and pea/wheat blend) have thus far been dispatched into Iraq under WFP's current emergency operation."
Daily Kos: "US to Iraq: Listen to the UN - The Bush administration, seeking to close the continuing rift between Shiite and dissident Sunni Arab leaders in Iraq, is enlisting Europe, the Arab world and the United Nations to pressure the Baghdad government to include minorities in the political process, administration and other diplomats say."
Charging RINO: "In order to make the United Nations an effective international institution as we move forward, this country must provide strong leadership and push for meaningful changes in the organization that will result in a more efficient, more useful, and more streamlined international response to events around the world."
Scrivener's Error: "According to today's NYT, a Congressionally mandated panel will report this week that the United Nations suffers from poor management, "dismal" staff morale and lack of accountability and professional ethics but will acknowledge the broad changes proposed for the organization by Secretary General Kofi Annan and urge the United States to support them."
Selected summary of United Nations related news and events
The Debate's Over: Globe is Warming
U.S. Panel's Report Criticizes U.N. and Proposes Overhaul
Funding For Africa Could 'Answer Prayers'
Rwandan Hutus 'forced back home'
Wildlife crime: On the trail of a Killer
Afghan Government Begins Disbanding of Illegal Armed Groups
Vietnam Refugees Get Snowy Home
"Charity now begins at your home computer. A new on-line video game that shows players how helping starving people can be exciting has attracted more than one million downloads from China to Canada.
The free game, Food Force, puts players behind the wheel of a United Nations food truck navigating its way through minefields or at the back of an airplane unloading food sacks in gusty conditions. The stakes are high -- if you make mistakes, starving people will die." Link
Selected summary of United Nations related news and events
Annan Urges Rich Countries to Help Poor
UNHCR Urges Kyrgyzstan to Stop Security Forces Deporting Uzbeks
UN rights team to inquire into human rights violations in Togo
Haiti: UN Peacekeeper, Red Cross Workers Wounded in Shooting
Annan: U.S. Withholding Dues Is Bad Idea
A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary
Captain's Quarters: "For Republicans around the country, the retirement of Jesse Helms has allowed many to breathe a little easier since 2003. While Helms' stalwart positions on foreign policy provided America much-needed backbone, especially in relation to the United Nations, his domestic views often caused unnecessary controversy and embarrassment."
Democracy Arsenal: "Yesterday the House International Relations Committee approved Rep. Henry Hyde's UN Reform Act of 2005. Many of the proposals contained in the legislation are sound. A good number repeat or amplify ideas that Kofi Annan has already been pushing. The problem with the newly approved legislation is that it requires withholding of 50% of U.S. assessed dues to the UN unless the requested reforms are implemented. But the breadth and depth of the reforms are such that its almost impossible to imagine that all will be quickly or completely agreed."
Emerging Technologies and Children: "Crumbs for Africa - Editorial in The New York Times - According to a poll, most Americans believe that the United States spends 24 percent of its budget on aid to poor countries; it actually spends well under a quarter of 1 percent. As Jeffrey Sachs, the Columbia University economist in charge of the United Nations' Millennium Project, put it so well, the notion that there is a flood of American aid going to Africa "is one of our great national myths."
Selected summary of United Nations related news and events
UN Presses Rich Nations to Meet Commitment to Poor
More Than a Million Children Work in Mines, "digging for survival," UN Says
Coalition Urges UN Curbs on Harmful Ocean Sounds
UN body says 60 percent of Eritreans Need Food Aid
"Launching an interim report on progress towards internationally agreed development targets, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today said this is a "make-or-break year for the world's poor, when world leaders must decide on concrete steps to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015." More...
A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary
Hedgehog Report: "Democrats Continue Filibuster On Bolton - From The LA Times. "The Senate standoff over John R. Bolton's nomination as ambassador to the United Nations continued Tuesday.... Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said Bush could end the impasse if he chose to. "This is not a standoff yet," he said after the luncheon. "It's up to the president. We're not the obstructionists. He is."
Progressive Commons: "As the John Bolton nomination process draws to its pathetic and inexorable close, and as the conservative refrain regarding UN reform has grown deliberately drone-like ... it is worth a look back at why the UN remains such a fundamentally important institution, one that we risk trivializing only to our own detriment. So it was with much happiness that I came upon a piece describing in fascinating detail the history of the UN's formation, a history largely forgotten or unknown, and one that gives us a very different picture of the role of the United Nations, both at its founding and today. Read up, and get armed - the battle to "reform," by which they mean "reduce, trivialize, and circumscribe," isn't a battle that we can afford to lose."
Washington Note: "The White House seems to think that it can wear down Democratic resolve and get two Dems to switch to cloture.... This is no longer about Bolton. It is about Frist's presidential chances -- and whether he wants to gamble his national identity on win/loss records on judges or John Bolton."