What do you think about UN call in Sudan

sweep_101

70,000 dead and 1.6m homeless, but the UN says it's not genocide

:eek:

Seen this headline today what do people think??

Full article here
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1465253,00.html

Sparks

sweep_101 wrote:

Seen this headline today what do people think??

That perhaps people are going to blame the UN for China's actions. What do you think?

Its odd but everyone says the UN is toothless and almost useless, but they all point and wonder what the UN will do. It will do the same as its done previously. Nothing.

While there will be political gestures of sympathy by most nations, none of them will commit themselves to help. Simply because nobody really cares. I could be wrong about this, but I don't think so.

sweep_101

I think that if they're willing and see that they can get away with it they will do it again. If the UN dosn't stand up to them who will? US and China are only interested in getting their oil companies in to the region i doubt they care about the people living there

It reminds me of Neville Chamberlain announcment in 1938

"Peace in Our Time"

What good is there in letting them get off relatively light :mad: imo

mike65

If the UN says its not genocide they dont have to act.
Thats why its something less even though its clearly genocide as defined by the OED.

Mike.

SkepticOne

sweep_101 wrote:

I think that if they're willing and see that they can get away with it they will do it again. If the UN dosn't stand up to them who will? US and China are only interested in getting their oil companies in to the region i doubt they care about the people living there

But the UN (and particularly the Security Council) is simply the amalgamation of the wishes of the US, China, Russia and the other countries that make it up with the more powerful countries having the most influence.

Sand

But the UN (and particularly the Security Council) is simply the amalgamation of the wishes of the US, China, Russia and the other countries that make it up with the more powerful countries having the most influence.

Exactly - it was designed and created to protect the post WW2 world order and the interests of the victors of that war. It cannot act independant of the wishes of these countries. It can only be invited to operate in a country at that country's permission - what to do then when the state is the perpatrator of the human right abuses? It cannot fund or mount operations without its members actually giving it the resources, which they can withdraw at any time they see fit. People imbuing the U.N. with some holy moral authority previously reserved for the Catholic Church and the Pope are deluding themselves.

Even if some democratic decision making body replaced the security council it would simply give more power to the least democratic states to repress action to bring about democracy in their states. And still the U.S, the E.U. and increasingly China with Russia never too far away would still be able to cajole, threaten, bribe and otherwise influence votes in a way that does not - or should not - occur in "people" democracies.

As an institution its dysfunctional because effectively it relies on the nations to police themselves, with the major powers deciding who gets punished and who doesnt. Nothings changed from a situation where it doesnt exist. Except that the moral authority granted to it crowds out any action independant of this old boys network.

SkepticOne

Sand wrote:

As an institution its dysfunctional because effectively it relies on the nations to police themselves, with the major powers deciding who gets punished and who doesnt. Nothings changed from a situation where it doesnt exist. Except that the moral authority granted to it crowds out any action independant of this old boys network.

Yes and any change to this scenario would require a UN with an independent military of such size that it could take on the larger powers. It would need this to be able to carry out actions against the wishes of those powers. It would also need this military to enforce the collection of funds to finance its actions. It would no longer be a voluntary organisation; it would become a world government.

Right now, if you exclude its members and just look at the infrastructure, it is really just a forum and diplomatic channel. It supplements normal diplomatic activity. Members can meet and hammer out agreements backing up their negotiations with whatever military and economic power they may have individually. UN staff including Kofi Annan may mediate in some disputes between nations.

Some may feel disappointed with this, but without such channels, the alternative might be actual war in some situations.

When the UN says that the 70,000 dead in Sudan is not genocide what they really mean is that there is little interest among its more powerful members.

arcadegame2004

So much for the UN being the panacea that will resolve all the problems of the world. The UN is not completely useless in theory. It needs to be reformed to stop one country blocking everything. But changes probably can't go through without all the Permanent Members of the UN Security Council at least agreeing not to block them. Unfortunately Russia and China are more concerned with the oil interests in Sudan, and trying to guilt-trip them on the human-rights situation in Sudan is most likely doomed to failure, especially given their own disgraceful violations of human-rights.

I am sick of the hypocrisy of our Western leaders. They travel to China to signore human-rights and defend trading interests, then express alarm at how others do the same with respect to Sudan.

monument

mike65 wrote:

If the UN says its not genocide they dont have to act.
Thats why its something less even though its clearly genocide as defined by the OED.

Mike.

What does this remind me of? Wasn’t it just another one of those things that they said they would never ignore again?

MadsL

arcadegame2004 wrote:

I am sick of the hypocrisy of our Western leaders. They travel to China to signore human-rights and defend trading interests, then express alarm at how others do the same with respect to Sudan.

And I am sick of the hypocrisy that condemns Western leaders like this and then states in another thread that:

There is simply no comparison with migration from the present-day developing world, where there is generally no persecution, famine or war

As a means of justifying your skewed perspective.

abccormac

“Generally speaking, the policy of attacking, killing and forcibly displacing members of some tribes does not evince a specific intent to annihilate, in whole or in part, a group distinguished on racial, ethnic, national or religious grounds,” it explained

I'm at a loss to see how the policy outlined above is not genocide.