Posted on 09/18/2004 6:03:15 AM PDT by watchout
Canada's voice lost amid UN gnashing Darfur crisis echoes Rwanda
Kelly McParland National Post
September 18, 2004
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If you want to know what happens when a country cedes its foreign policy to the United Nations, as Canada has done, all you have to do is look at Sudan.
The crisis in that country's Darfur region is textbook UN -- a complex conflict in an impoverished country in a remote part of the world, which gets dumped on the world body because nobody knows quite what else to do about it.
There is much talk, and plenty of threats. But none of it leads anywhere. This week alone, both the United States and the European Union threatened sanctions unless Sudan's Islamic government halts its support for the Arab militias that have been terrorizing the black African population of Darfur.
The echoes of Rwanda are self-evident. Romeo Dallaire, the retired Canadian general who served in Rwanda, said the situation in Sudan "makes me sick."
The World Health Organization estimates 50,000 people have already died, and are dying at a rate of up to 10,000 a month.
"These figures are higher than those we had from East Timor, higher than the figures we had from Iraq in 1991, comparable to what we had in Rwanda in the bad times," said Dr. David Nabarro, head of crisis operations for the WHO.
But the bloodshed goes on. Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary-General, sounds increasingly desperate as arm-twisting continues over a resolution in the Security Council. "It is urgent to act now. Civilians are still being attacked and fleeing their villages as we speak," he said yesterday
This should be a concern to everyone, but particularly to Canadians, since we've hitched our wagon so firmly to the UN. As Jean Chretien made clear during the debate over Iraq, Canada has no independent foreign policy.
"We are multilateralists. We are just one of 191 members of the General Assembly, and wherever the tide flows, we drift along. It may be in a direction we aren't particularly happy with, but no matter. We're just one voice in the crowd, and often not a very loud one.
Paul Martin has made no apparent effort to change that. A spokesman said recently the Prime Minister is "very concerned" by the crisis. As we know from last spring's election campaign, there are many things Mr. Martin is very concerned about. Sometimes he is very, very concerned, and on occasion he is even very, very, very concerned.
But Darfur only gets one very, which isn't much for a place where more than a million people have been forced from their homes.
Perhaps because Ottawa is aware of this, Pierre Pettigrew, the Foreign Affairs Minister, leaked word that Ottawa will increase its support for an African peacekeeping force. The crisis has been growing for six months, but until recently Canada's contribution had amounted to $250,000 in equipment for the force, a pittance even by the paltry standards Canadians have become accustomed to.
Now that sum is to be increased to $20-million. The money will be used to pay troops from other countries to try to stop the fighting between Khartoum's proxy army, known as the Janjaweed, on one hand, and local militias on the other....Continued
Canada, like other western powers, has no intention of sending its own troops to the region. For all the noise we make about peacekeeping, Canada doesn't actually do much of it any more. There are some obvious exceptions, but for the most part we satisfy ourselves with financing other soldiers to do the work.
In Sudan, that means an African Union force, made up mainly of Nigerians. In this case it only makes sense -- a bunch of pale, Christian westerners wandering around the desert would hardly have the credibility of fellow Africans from a country with a large Islamic population.
But it's still only money, and it's symbolic of what Canada has willingly reduced itself to through years of playing spectator on the world stage. While we exalt the glories of membership in the UN, the practical reality is that little gets done.
Sudanese leaders know they are free to ignore the UN because its structure precludes serious measures to back up its demands. As Senator Richard Lugar asked Colin Powell, the U.S. Secretary of State, at a hearing last week: "Does anybody, including the government of Sudan, pay any attention to the UN?"
The answer is yes, and no. Countries like Canada, which want an excuse to avoid action, find the world body's chronic indecision highly useful. But anyone seriously hoping for a solution to the crises it faces can do little but despair.
Islamic countries have developed a highly effective alliance over the years, working together in the General Assembly to aid and abet one another, and they have no interest in assisting a campaign that targets the Islamic leaders who run Sudan.
China also has little enthusiasm for measures aimed at a country where it has significant energy interests. China is developing rapidly and desperately needs oil to fuel its growth. Sudan produces about 345,000 barrels of oil a day, with China and India the biggest buyers. Beijing is also the biggest investor in a pipeline project to move the oil across the desert. Beijing said this week it would use its veto in the Security Council to block any measure that threatens its supply.
So that's that. Washington, as usual showing more spunk than Ottawa, has been piling pressure on Sudan, via the UN and through direct efforts of the State Department. Powell says the U.S. considers the killings in Darfur to be genocide, and has been circulating a resolution threatening economic sanctions, unless the government reins in the militias and stops blocking the African Union peacekeepers.
Powell acknowledged that just using the term "genocide" does not guarantee action will be taken, but even that is too much for Ottawa.
A spokesman for minister Pettigrew said Canada would not join the U.S. in designating the situation as genocide.
"Genocide is defined in a fairly narrow manner legally," he said. "And [it has] a very high burden of proof with respect to intent. The key word here is intent. Which we believe has not been met, legally."
Makes you feel warm all over, doesn't it? Military helicopters are blowing the hell out of mud huts, and Ottawa is debating the legalisms of terminology.
Canada is essentially bankrupt with its inefficient, poorly functioning, mega-expensive socialist nightmare of a system. It has no money for NATIONAL defense, much less projecting any international presence.
"Countries like Canada, which want an excuse to avoid action, find the world body's chronic indecision highly useful. But anyone seriously hoping for a solution to the crises it faces can do little but despair."
This is the orgainization John Kerry wants to entrust our country to. Feh!
Did Chretien really say that?
I wonder when the Canadians are going to wake up to the fact that socialism does not work.
"Al Qanada".
Headline should read" Canada admits they are irrelevant"
Canada's voice is the equivalent of one screaming fan at a rock concert....... an insiginificant face in the crowd.
Nine new states after merging with the USA. Quebec can go it alone as a socialist frozen third world country, supplying electricity and wood products to more advanced nations.
Amen. I used to do Navy policy toward Canada. And in the early 90s when Quebec was threatening secession, cutting off the Maritime provinces from the rest of Canada, the thinking was that they (the Maritimes) would sue to join the U.S. if Quebe seceded. Others even thought the western provinces would do the same. The sole holdout would be Ontario, the center of English-speaking Canada which pretty much defines itself (arrogantly as): we are everything the U.S. is, except we don't have racial strife and poverty. Well, screw them. They'll make a nice tidy country with the lunatic Quebecois to the east, the U.S. to the south, and the new U.S. state of Manitoba to its west.
"I wonder when the Canadians are going to wake up to the fact that socialism does not work."
When the UN tells the Canadians to wake up and face the fact that socialism does not work!
Nothing is going to change as long as Paul Martin and the sorry excuse for government (liberals) are in power. Paul Martin Supports Cretiens UN policy. Plus Paul Martins mentor, and long time enviromental activist Maurice Strong, the unelected official who's office sits right next door to Paul martins, is koffi Annan's unofficial Advisor, along with now ex- prime minister, John Cretien.
Google "Maurice Strong" for shocking facts.
What is more shocking, is that John Kerry want's to join that corrupt club, which also has several American activist members already.
Jac Chirac, John Cretien, and John Kerry, Maurice Strong the UN- Paris elete. (Shudder)
has anyone wondered just how the cheap oil for big personal profit connection goes? Check out Canada's ex- prime minister's connection to petro-fina, though his daughters husband to Chirac, Maurice, Koffi Annan.
The UN is corrupto the core
So Bert,
If you think Canada's voice in the Un is insugnificant, you should dig a little deeper, the have a huge voice, you just don't hear it. it's evil, corruptto the core. You'd be supprized of the names on that list, American ones as well.
The Canadian taxpayers spend hundreds of millions of dollars to comply with the futile and moreover needless attempts to fight global warming and to cope with the economic and political consequences arising from that. They also fund, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts and government loan guaranties, their prime minister's (Paul Martin) billion-dollar corporation, Canada Steamship Lines, that Maurice Strong, who had hired Paul Martin after the latter finished university, had helped the Martin family to acquire.
In addition, taxpayer funding also goes to help with Maurice Strong's attempt to impose a new-age religion, Earth worship, on the world population with the help of Mikhail Gorbachev, Kofi Anan and Stephen Rockefeller.
Maurice Strong is now a senior advisor to Paul Martin's Prime Minister's Office, the most powerful government department in Canada.
Make sure you do not miss the excerpt that deals with Maurice Strong, the real power behind Kyoto: "Maurice Strong: A Dr. Evil-style strategist. Owner of a 200,000-acre New Age Zen colony [in Colorado]. Designer of a proposal to "consider" requiring licences to have babies. The architect of the Kyoto Protocol." It is an eye-opener, especially the strong ties to the powers in Canadian politics.
http://www.fathersforlife.org/culture/kyoto_connection.htm
this is what bush has been resisting, but kerry want's to drag America, kicking and screaming, into.
It should be noted that this is what Bush and Putin put the brakes on when they voted "NO" to the Kyoto accord.
You may think Paul Martin is just another brainless liberal Canadian idiot, Not true. He's a powerful and dangerous brainless liberal Canadian idiot. Imagine the disaster this world will see if kerry gets in. He's all for this Maurice Strong "new world order". Idea. So was kerry's father.
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