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I am quoted in today’s NYT on a new report issued by the Global Humanitarian Forum which makes the absurd claim that 315,000 deaths a year can be attributed to the effects of rising greenhouse gas concentrations. Here is what I said: Roger A. Pielke Jr., a political scientist at the University of Colorado, Boulder, who studies disaster trends, said the forum’s report was “a methodological embarrassment� because there was no way to distinguish deaths or economic losses related to human-driven global warming amid the much larger losses resulting from the growth in populations and economic development in vulnerable regions....

Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga have signed an agreement to end the country's post-election crisis. At a ceremony in Nairobi, the two men put their signatures to a power-sharing deal brokered by ex-UN head Kofi Annan. --snip-- Speaking after the signing, Mr Kibaki said: "This process has reminded us that as a nation there are more issues that unite than that divide us... "We've been reminded we must do all in our power to safeguard the peace that is the foundation of our national unity... Kenya has room for all of us." Political violence has ignited...

Gangs armed with machetes and bows and arrows burned and hacked to death members of a rival tribe in western Kenya Sunday, as the number of dead from the latest explosion of violence over disputed presidential elections rose to 69. Houses were blazing in the tourist gateway town of Naivasha, torched by members of President Mwai Kibaki's tribe exacting revenge on their Luo rivals... The latest deaths raise the toll to nearly 800 killed in ethnic violence and clashes with police since Kibaki was declared winner of Dec. 27 balloting that international and local observers say had a rigged tally....

JOHANNESBURG (AFP) - Former United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan on Sunday slammed Africa's brutal regimes, sit-tight leaders and conflicts in the midst of chronic poverty and disease. "About half of the worlds's armed conflicts and some three quarters of the UN's peacekeepers are in Africa. This is because millions of Africans are still at the mercy of brutal regimes... showing no respect for human rights, or even human life," he said in a speech in South Africa for Nelson Mandela's birthday. Annan said the former South African president showed a "wonderful" example when he quit office in 1999 at...

Heavy metal legend Dave Mustaine and TAS's old friend, Human Events editor Jed Babbin, probably don't share too many overlapping areas of interest. But, as Megadeth's latest offering United Abominations makes clear, the transgressions of a certain international body situated on the Hudson River is one topic over which the guitarist and Inside the Asylum author could have a meeting of the minds. In a mere five minutes and thirty-seven seconds United Abominations' title track encapsulates a litany of complaints against this "blot on the face of humanity," as Mustaine sneeringly calls it, from its practical indifference to ethnic cleansing...

BOULDER — University of Colorado students paid $160,000 in April to hear former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan say the people of the world must work together to bring about peace. The amount came as a surprise Wednesday to several members of CU's board of regents, who saw the figure on a routine list of speakers and their fees for the school year that just ended. Annan was far ahead of the second-highest-paid speaker, liberal historian and activist Howard Zinn, who received $15,500. The amount for the one-hour speech brought calls from some regents for more frequent audits of student government,...

That cup of coffee just not getting it done anymore? How about a Buzz Donut or a Buzzed Bagel? That's what Doctor Robert Bohannon, a Durham, North Carolina, molecular scientist, has come up with. Bohannon says he's developed a way to add caffeine to baked goods, without the bitter taste of caffeine. Each piece of pastry is the equivalent of about two cups of coffee. While the product is not on the market yet, Bohannon has approached some heavyweight companies, including Krispy Kreme, Dunkin' Donuts and Starbucks about carrying it.

Kofi Annan had a pet peeve – Israel. If only Israel would do this or that, terrorism would end, peace would come to the Middle East, harmony would reverberate around the world, and the reasons for hating the rest of us would wither away. It was, and is, a lie that has served the world's worst human rights violators well, allowing them to escape scrutiny since the UN is otherwise occupied. It therefore comes as no surprise to learn of the tally of condemnations coming from the General Assembly during the fall of 2006: Resolutions condemning Israel for human rights...

On his way out the door, Kofi Annan has signed new rules meant to curb corruption in UN procurement activities, which since the Feds began investigating last year have been sprouting indictments and guilty pleas pertaining to the abuse of enormous amounts of taxpayer money on Kofi’s watch. It’s thoughtful of Kofi to bequeath brand new rules to his successor, Ban Ki-moon, who takes charge Jan. 1. But this leaves the question of why Kofi, who worked in the UN system for more than four decades, and spent much of that time deep in the nitty-gritty of UN personnel and...

UNITED NATIONS - U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday a negotiated settlement with Iran over its nuclear program should be sought, and he warned that military intervention would be "unwise and disastrous." Annan, who steps down as U.N. chief Dec. 31, issued the warning as the Security Council debated a resolution that would impose sanctions on Tehran for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment. The United States is considering sending a second aircraft carrier to Persian Gulf as a show of force against Iran. He addressed concerns about a possible military operation in Iran at a farewell news conference in response...

As Secretary-General Annan prepares to leave his post at the United Nations, a mystery is surfacing surrounding his apartment on Roosevelt Island, subsidized by New York taxpayers, which is still in use by the family of his brother, Kobina Annan. The apartment was where Mr. Annan and his wife lived before 1997, when he became secretary-general. The Roosevelt Island home is part of an estate of low-rent state-regulated housing. For years, the Annans saved considerable sums by occupying an apartment meant to help financially strapped low- to moderate-income New York families. One question Mr. Annan has never addressed is why...

As Secretary-General Annan prepares to leave his post at the United Nations, a mystery is surfacing surrounding his apartment on Roosevelt Island, subsidized by New York taxpayers, which is still in use by the family of his brother, Kobina Annan. The apartment was where Mr. Annan and his wife lived before 1997, when he became secretary-general. The Roosevelt Island home is part of an estate of low-rent state-regulated housing. For years, the Annans saved considerable sums by occupying an apartment meant to help financially strapped low- to moderate-income New York families. One question Mr. Annan has never addressed is why...

Chuck Hagel: Global framework must recognize 21st-century realities BY CHUCK HAGEL The writer, of Omaha, is Nebraska's senior U.S. senator. In a 1953 speech delivered in Denver, President Dwight D. Eisenhower presented a new nuclear frame of reference for the world. He knew if the world was to survive in a nuclear age, it would require new thinking relevant to the world's new nuclear realities. Nuclear power had become part of mankind. Eisenhower laid out in the Denver speech his thoughts on how nuclear power could be used for something productive and positive to be shared by all people rather...

[ed. note - found in a remodeling dumpster at 48th and FDR Drive: first draft of Kofi Annan's valediction] Nearly 50 years ago, when I arrived in Minnesota as a student fresh from Africa, I had much to learn. For example, the concept of “connecting flights,” because I was actually supposed to be going to California. My cab had already plowed through several miles of Minneapolis snowdrifts before I realized my horrible mistake, but I decided to make the best of it. Over the next few years I adapted to the quaint arctic customs of the indigenous Minnesotans -- wearing...

The skivvy around the United Nations is that when Secretary-General Annan makes his final remarks to the Security Council on the Middle East today, he is going to let Iran and Syria off the hook and seek to blame Israel for the woes of the region. This is the gist of what was picked up and reported on the Sun's online edition yesterday by our Daniel Freedman, who reckons it will be a telling moment for Mr. Annan. "Will he finally recognize what America, and even Europe, have recognized — that the election of the terrorist group Hamas into government...

UN Human Rights Council's Israel Spotlight Continues (CNSNews.com) - The U.N. Human Rights Council has ended its third session having spent more time focused on Israel than on all 191 other U.N. member states put together. According to statistics drawn up by the Hudson Institute's Eye on the U.N. project, the Geneva-based body dedicated nine hours during the Nov. 27-Dec. 8 session to Israel, compared to six hours spent on discussing other country-specific situations in the rest of the globe. The rest of the time was spent on issues not specifically relating to individual states, it said. The HRC was...

Kofi Annan has put us on official notice. He says "The US must not sacrifice its democratic ideals to fight terrorism." I appreciate Kofi's sentiments the way I appreciate the punch line of any good joke. I think the shorthand version of Kofi's remarks would read "The US must not fight terrorism." On a day when fellow UN member nation Iran opened a conference to question whether Nazi Germany actually killed Jews in gas chambers, Kofi Annan's protest speech becomes even more hilarious. It's the context that sometimes lends humor to good knee-slapper of a joke. Iran may hold an...

INDEPENDENCE, Mo. - U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in his farewell address, criticized the Bush administration, warning that America must not sacrifice its Democratic ideals while waging war against terrorism. In remarks prepared for delivery Monday at the Truman Presidential Museum and Library, Annan also said the Security Council should be expanded. “Human rights and the rule of law are vital to global security and prosperity,” Annan’s text said. When the U.S. “appears to abandon its own ideals and objectives, its friends abroad are naturally troubled and confused,” he said. Annan, who leaves the United Nations on Dec. 31 after 10...

Outgoing U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan plans to offer a blistering criticism of the Bush administration's foreign policy in a farewell speech Monday to a crowd in Independence, Mo. A copy of the speech obtained by FOX News, shows Annan is expected to accuse the U.S. administration of committing human rights abuses in the name of fighting terrorism, and of taking military action without broad international support. Respect for human rights and the rule of law can be advanced only "if America remains true to its principles, including in the struggle against terrorism," the speech says. "When it appears to abandon...

Sudan has agreed to accept non-military support from the United Nations for the African Union peacekeeping force in its war-torn Darfur region, a top AU official said after talks in Nigeria. "The PSC welcomed Sudan?s acceptance of the use of UN systems and command and control structures," AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) head Said Djinnit told reporters late Thursday after a meeting on Darfur on the sidelines of an African-South American summit. A source close to the talks told AFP that "systems and command and control structures" referred essentially to UN logistical support and to the question of who...

Excerpt - GENEVA (AP)--U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday that the U.S. was "trapped in Iraq," and urged Washington to carefully consider when would be the best time to pull out of the country so the withdrawal doesn't lead to a further deterioration of security. "The United States in a way is trapped in Iraq," Annan said. "It cannot stay and it cannot leave. There are those who maintain that its presence is a problem and there are those who say that if it leaves precipitously, the situation will get worse." (MORE TO FOLLOW)

NAIROBI (AFP) - UN chiefKofi Annan demanded that world leaders give climate change the same priority as they did to wars and to curbing the spread of weapons of mass destruction. Annan made the appeal as he launched a three-day gathering of environment chiefs, tasked with stepping up action against global warming. In his valedictory speech to the annual meeting, the UN secretary-general painted a sombre tableau about the effects of climate change, especially on impoverished countries that were least to blame for it. And he lacerated the fast-shrinking minority of politicians or scientists who still denied there was any...

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) -- South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon will be formally nominated as U.N. secretary-general on Monday, ironically only hours after North Korea defied the world body by announcing a nuclear test. The U.N. Security Council will cast its votes, effectively anointing Ban as the successor to Secretary-General Kofi Annan whose 10 years in office expire on Dececmber 31. Six other candidates withdrew, leaving members to vote for Ban only. The 192-member U.N. General Assembly must give final approval to Ban's nomination, which usually follows within a week or two. The vote is expected to be positive. Some...

Kofi Annan, the United Nations Secretary-General, welcomed the release of Russian officers in Georgia and called on all sides to come together and engage constructively to address existing problems. Meanwhile his latest report on the Caucasus country speaks of new tensions in the long-running dispute between Georgian authorities and Abkhaz separatists stemming from an operation by Georgian Special Forces, and he warns that only dialogue can resolve differences. "The Secretary-General is pleased that Georgia and the Russian Federation have been able to resolve the issue of the recent arrest of Russian officers in Georgia in a peaceful and constructive manner,"...

IMHO (in my humble opinion) SHAKES LOOSE © by Norman Liebmann In my humble opinion, western civilization may be doomed. Every gook in the Middle East is cursing the Pope and not one single Irishman has rolled up his sleeves. In my humble opinion, Hillary Clinton’s smile could rust a column of Abrams tanks to a halt. In my humble opinion, despite Oliver Stone’s naïve assertion that Hollywood promotes war, when he grows up to be a big boy he will realize Hollywood never promotes anything but itself. In my humble opinion, inveterate yachtsman Walter Cronkite will donate his famous...

Lotta talk today about the UN. Joseph Klein at Frontpage Mag had a piece outlining the need for truth and a "restoration" of the founding principles of the UN. I'm curious to know what founding principles he is referring to:

HAVANA - Cuban television showed brief video footage of ailing President Fidel Castro standing to greet UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, and chatting with the visiting dignitary. ‘You look very well, your handshake is strong,’ Annan told Castro during the meeting in a hospitAl like room. The Cuban leader, clad in a dressing gown, stood up to greet Annan, and then sat down as the two chatted. ‘Let me tell you, you look very well, after traveling so much ... around the world,’ Castro said in a soft voice. Castro gave the UN chief a copy of ‘100 Hours with...

UNITED NATIONS Secretary-General Kofi Annan has refused to fill out a newly minted U.N. financial disclosure form, rejecting advice of his inner circle that doing so would send a good signal as the U.N. seeks to counter allegations that it is closed to public scrutiny, U.N. officials said Thursday. The U.N. unveiled new rules last year that tightened staff financial disclosure requirements in effect since 1999. Annan is not required to fill out the form because he is technically not a staff member. Nonetheless, two U.N. officials told The Associated Press that several of Annan's top aides had recently urged...

The UN has appointed Antero Lopes as Acting Police Commissioner for the UN peacekeeping operation Timor East, the world body announced Tuesday. Lopes joined the UN Integrated Mission in East Timor (UNMIT) in mid-August. He had previously assisted in the planning of the police component of the new mission as a member of the assessment mission led by Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Special Envoy, Ian Martin, in June. From 1993 to 1995 Lopes served as a Regional Commander and Chief of Operations in the former Yugoslavia, where he was also co-founder of the project that lead to the Human Rights Commission...

TEHRAN, Iran — U.N. chief Kofi Annan said Sunday that the Holocaust was "an undeniable historical fact" after Iran said it would sponsor a conference to question what it said was Holocaust exaggerations, in a provocative move timed during his visit. The decision came as Annan raised concerns with Iranian officials over an exhibition of cartoons about the Holocaust in Iran's capital, Tehran. Hard-line President Ahmoud Ahmadinejad has called the Nazis' slaughter of 6 million Jews a myth... "God willing, a conference on the Holocaust will be held in the autumn. The Holocaust is not a sacred issue that one...

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said Sunday afternoon following a meeting with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that the Iranian leader had expressed willingness to cooperate with the international community to reach a solution to the escalating crisis around Iran's nuclear enrichment program. However, Annan stressed, Iran remained steadfast in its refusal to cease enrichment ahead of talks.

BEIRUT, Lebanon — U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said that an Israeli commando raid deep in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley on Saturday violated the U.N. brokered cease-fire deal, putting the six-day cease-fire with Hezbollah guerrillas to a critical test. Israel said the raid was launched to stop arms smuggling to the militant Shiite fighters, but Lebanon said the operation violated the U.N. truce agreement. One Israeli officer was killed fighting Hezbollah guerrillas, and two were wounded, one seriously. "All such violations of Security Council resolution 1701 endanger the fragile calm that was reached after much negotiation and undermine the authority of the...

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Monday that his country was ready to help restore sustainable peace in the Mideast region, the Fars news agency reported. Ahmadinejad made the remarks in a phone conversation with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the presidential press office said in a statement. According to the statement, in the phone conversation initiated by Annan, the two discussed the latest developments in the Mideast region, UN Security Council Resolution 1701 on the Lebanon crisis and ways to achieve a ceasefire on the Lebanese soil. Ahmadinejad and Annan also stressed the need to establish stability, sustainable and fair...

UNITED NATIONS - Jay-Z boycotted premium champagne Cristal at his clubs after the brand's owner made some remarks he didn't like. Now the rap superstar has a new favorite drink: water. - - - - - Snip - - - - "I figure that once I stumbled upon that, if the information was out and young people knew that these problems exist while we're having Poland Springs at Cipriani and things like that, that we'll get involved," said the 36-year-old rapper, referring to the high-class restaurant chain.

UNITED NATIONS - Israel's air raid on in the Lebanese town of Qana, which killed 28 people, may be part of a larger pattern of violations of international law in the war between Israel and Hezbollah, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a report Monday. In that light, Annan said that the July 30 attack was sufficiently serious to merit a more comprehensive investigation. The attack should be seen "in the broader context of what could be, based on preliminary information available to the United Nations ... a pattern of violations of international law, including international humanitarian law and international...

Like soft drinks and poison, anti-Semitism comes in various flavors and strengths. It is easy and tempting to wax cynical about Mel Gibson, the once-famously outraged-for-being-called-an-anti-Semite Hollywood powerhouse who recently, under the revealing effects of alcohol, proved his erstwhile accusers to have if anything underestimated the depth of his animus for Jews. And, indeed, cynics abound. I am not among them. Not that I am beyond cynicism, unfortunately. But Mr. Gibson's apology, in which he disowned his drunken diatribe and asked the Jewish community to help him in "the process of understanding where those vicious words came from," cannot be...

It was a cool December evening. The Sabbath had ended, and the sons and daughters of Jerusalem bad good-bye to their parents and flooded outside to have fun with their friends on a Saturday night...In the crowd was Assaf Avitan, a fifteen-year-old tenth grader who had just been accepted into a special program for gifted children. Assaf joined his friends that night to celebrate the sixteenth birthday of twins from his Jerusalem neighborhood. He was accompanied by his buddy, fifteen-year-old Golan Turgeman...It was 11:30 pm and Assaf and his pal had been standing on the sidewalk for about fifteen...

In the past three days UN observers have reported frequent attacks close to their positions. Heavy shelling around Khiam on Tuesday had forced the four observers into the bomb shelters. At about 1.20pm, officials say, a jet dropped a bomb only 300 metres away. The observers contacted the Unifil headquarters. The observers warned Israel that their aircraft were dropping bombs dangerously close to a UN position. The Israelis said that they would check the situation and make any necessary adjustments, UN officials say. But jets then dropped ten bombs between 100 and 300 metres from the UN position and fired...

Sometimes it seems as if United Nations Secretary General Kofi Anan isn't really of this world. For a head of the United nations he seems to exhibit a surprising otherworldliness. Today, a direct strike against a UNIFIL post in southern Lebanon by an Israeli shell killing four UN military observers has been lambasted by Anan as a deliberate attack. This accusation is without any foundation and Israel has rightly demanded an apology. UNIFIL began as an opportunity for peace, but the UN Interim Force in Lebanon has never made good on its promise. It looked on as Hizballah fortified southern...

So then Hezbollah drags mindless newsmen and women to the scene and screams, “Look what the bloodthirsty Jews are doing to us!!” And Kofi Annan agrees that the U.S. or Israel is to blame? More at: http://peace-and-freedom.blogspot.com/

MIDI - TELL LAURA I LOVE HER That Kofi Annan's a partisan...we all watch what he has done He has condemned Jews...no big surprise which side he'd choose We know all about oil for food...hey, Kofi, we're not in the mood Israel should stand up and say...just hit the road and go away Hey, Kofi, just shove it...to hear that, I'd love it Hey, Kofi, we've heard enough...we'll send you something you can stuff The UN is worthless as they come...it is filled with useless scum In orange jumpsuit may we see...both Kofi Annan and Hillary Get the UN...

War on terrorism's most idiotic phrase to date: "Proportionate response to terrorism." How do Kofi and the friends of terror manage to say it with a straight face? It follows the same logic as being a little bit pregnant.

New York - A renewed controversy erupted Friday before next week's UN conference on small arms and light weapons, as UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan insisted organization has no plan to take away Americans' right to bear arms. The US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, charged that the conference may infringe on Americans' constitutional right to bear weapons. He vowed to defend that right when the two-week conference opens on Monday, saying that some UN members may have a 'larger agenda' aimed at the US Constitution's Second Amendment, which protects the right to own weapons. 'The message is clear: to...

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Following unprecedented criticism of U.S. popular and governmental attitudes toward the United Nations, the world organization's second-ranking official ended his June 6 speech in New York with this rhetorical question: "Who will campaign in 2008 for a new multilateral national security?" Unbelievably but unmistakably, U.N. Deputy Secretary General Mark Malloch Brown was injecting himself into the next American presidential election."He was shamelessly pandering to partisan interests," Republican Sen. Norm Coleman, who has led congressional pressure for U.N. reform, told me. Malloch Brown's remarkable speech was delivered under the auspices of two left-of-center think tanks, one of them...

book review ON INCOMPETENCE Gregory R. Copley, President, International Strategic Studies Association An International Relations Debacle: The UN Secretary-General's Mission of Good Offices in Cyprus 1999-2004, by Claire Palley. Oxford. UK. and Portland. Oregon, USA, 2005: Hart Publishing. ISBN: 1-84113-578-X. 395pp, illust., hardcover. $45. Rarely, in lives filled with books, is a vol- ume found which has the power to pro- foundly influence minds with the com- pelling weight and wisdom of its facts and arguments, and with the movingly restrained passion of its compilation. Claire Pal ley's work, An International Relations Debacle: The UN Secretary- General's Mission of Good...

The announcement of the three carefully orchestrated suicides of the terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay arrived in that packet of news briefs on Fox with little accompanying fanfare. Just a how do you do and an update out of that small bit of democratic America on that great big island of oppression where the liberals grow teary eyed about Fidel’s marvelous health care system, where a toothy Jimmy Carter’s photo also hangs on the murderous Mr. Castro’s wall, and where Mr. Chavez often calls. Sadly, like so many deaths which had preceded these, they were choreographed to maximize their attention...

Eric Shawn is the author of the new book "The U.N. Exposed: How the United Nations Sabotages America's Security and Fails the World," a scathing look at the United Nations' ineptitude, corruption and crimes against humanity. Shawn, a veteran Fox News Network anchor who has covered issues surrounding the United Nations for years, sat down with NewsMax to talk about his eye-opening book.

The United Nations has launched another effort at “reform,” designed to convince the American taxpayers that things are changing for the better at an institution known for corrupt practices. The public face of this effort is an American, Christopher Burnham, the new U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Management, who recently spoke to the Heritage Foundation about affirming “the highest ethical standards” at the world body and making sure the world body is more open and accountable. Unfortunately for him, he agreed to take questions, one of which – about the U.N. Secretary-General getting a $500,000 personal gift from a foreign government –...

See for example this thread first. The US is breaking the law Says somebody, flapping his jaw It's Kofi Annan who shows once 'ag-ain' that he's like the U.N.'s Lord Haw Haw.

There are still too many complaints of sexual abuse against United Nations troops, the head of peacekeeping operations has said. Jean-Marie Guehenno said the UN had investigated 295 cases under a new reporting system introduced last year. It could take several more years to reform the system fully, says Jordan's UN envoy who last year urged changes. The 18 peace missions worldwide employ 85,000 staff from over 100 countries, with a budget of nearly $5bn. Mr Guehenno said although significant progress had been made in reducing the number of cases of sexual exploitation following an investigation in the Democratic Republic...