Finally--an Adminstration that is actually fighting to keep the cold, clammy paws of this palpably anti-American "World Court" from grabbing at the precious sovereignty of Lady Liberty.
Posted on 07/02/2002 11:35:38 AM PDT by znix
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Security Council diplomats said on Tuesday they would prepare to shut down the U.N. mission in Bosnia after losing hope Washington would bend on its demand for immunity for American peacekeepers from a new global war crimes court.
Envoys said European Union ( news - web sites)'s U.N. ambassadors had discussed the matter at a morning meeting and decided to plan an early shift of responsibility for the mission to the EU, which was to take over at the end of this year in any case.
Despite a fierce international outcry, Washington threatens to shut down peacekeeping missions, one by one, unless the 15-nation council passes a resolution putting its peacekeepers and other overseas officials beyond the grasp of the International Criminal Court, which came into force on Monday.
Four more U.N. missions are due to come up for renewal in July, including a key operation in the Middle East that monitors the volatile border between Israel and Lebanon.
President Bush ( news - web sites) has rejected the court as a threat to U.S. sovereignty.
The U.S. administration insists the United States remains vulnerable to politically motivated or frivolous prosecutions of its personnel who might be based in a country that has ratified the treaty establishing the court.
"We'll try to work out the impasse at the United Nations ( news - web sites) but one thing we're not going to do is sign on to the International Criminal Court," Bush said in Milwaukee on Tuesday.
"The president thinks it is a vital matter of principle to protect American service men and women and peacekeepers," White House spokesman Ari Fleischer ( news - web sites) told reporters traveling with the president.
Asked whether Bush was using the dispute as a pretext to get out of international peacekeeping commitments, Fleischer said: "Absolutely not. This is on the merits of the trouble that the United States sees for (the) men and women who serve our country abroad."
The other 14 members of the Security Council and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan ( news - web sites), however, insist that adequate safeguards exist to protection Americans abroad.
MULTIPLE MISSIONS
The mandate of the U.N. Bosnia mission, a 1,500-strong police training mission that includes 46 American police officers, is set to run out at midnight on Wednesday (0400 GMT on Thursday) unless it is renewed by the council.
The United States on Sunday vetoed a resolution to extend the mission for six months but then agreed to keep it alive for three more days while diplomats searched for a way out of the impasse.
Raising the stakes in the high-level game of brinkmanship, Washington said on Monday it was showing it meant business by pulling its three U.S. military observers out of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in East Timor ( news - web sites).
But it was leaving in place for now its other overseas personnel, including U.S. troops in a separate NATO ( news - web sites)-led force in Bosnia and another 75 Americans in East Timor who were helping train the new Asian nation's nascent police force.
The new global criminal court was created to pursue heinous wrongdoing such as gross human rights abuses, genocide and war crimes, but only when national courts fail to do so.
It has jurisdiction over any acts committed after Monday, although it will not have any judges or a prosecutor in its headquarters in The Hague ( news - web sites), Netherlands, until early next year.
The treaty creating the court has now been ratified by 76 countries, with Australia and Honduras the latest on Monday.
Bosnia's international High Representative Paddy Ashdown said a shutdown of the U.N. mission six months before its planned shift to EU responsibility would undermine the chances Bosnia could become "a successful and prosperous country," as the international community hoped.
In an op-ed article in The New York Times, he said the mission's law enforcement training was "central to removing terrorists and organized crime" from the war-torn country and vital to giving refugees the confidence they need to return home after the Balkan state's bloody three-year conflict.
TC
It would make more sense if we were concerened about the
nations that will be unable to defend themselves against this
tyranny.
If it is dangerous to us, then it is dangerous to them, so we should
not only be opposed to this affecting our people, but all people.
But it will probably be ok as long as it is some jerk we don't like.
You mean the Muslim terrorists that Clinton and Blair's NATO and their Islamic Bosnian allies invited into Bosnia to butcher Serbs and who then helped al-Qaeda get a base to organize 9/11 from? Tough luck Paddy! Let the Serbs finish that job for you.
The rest of them appear to WANT this tyranny. They won't learn until the oppression hits them personally.
Our natural allies are those we had in WWII and I do not include France. Russia and Serbia stood with us at that time, plus the British empire. The peacekeepers in Yugoslavia should be US, Russian, and Serbian. The Muslims in Bosnia ought to be removed to Albania, the Islamic world, or better yet to Allah himself.
Finally--an Adminstration that is actually fighting to keep the cold, clammy paws of this palpably anti-American "World Court" from grabbing at the precious sovereignty of Lady Liberty.
President Bush we stand behind you 100% !!! David
Yeah, yeah, I know - probably a future Mujahadeen, just like all 2 million of the Muslims in Bosnia, but then stupid is as stupid does, and the results of Milosevic's wars speak louder than any protestations as to his intent or righteousness of method.
As far as his opponents were concerned, the worse, the better. And they don't come much worse than Milosevic these days, do they, Destro.
You haven't seen Pericles or Spar around, have you?
May we all live to see their ancestral homeland of KosovO-Metohija returned to the proud Serbian nation, and undo the filth brought about by XXX-President Clinton.
They must have thought they had a really strong hand for some reason.. Obviously more reason than what's given here.
"all over but the crying"
I wouldn't expect anything less from somebody paid to drive around the Bosnian countryside in a ridiculously oversized vehicle tossing candy at children already suffering from malnutrition.
No.
So keep crying, Ichabod. It suits you well.
In short the answer to your question is YES.. I respect your opinion, however your characterization of my service to MY country is inacurate to say the least... My understanding of the Dayton Peace Accords is that there would be NO "peace" without U.S. leadership.. Personally I don't think the U.S. has an "obligation" to meddle in the affairs of other nations unless we are invited, and even then we should carefully consider the far reaching consequences of such involvement...
FReegards,
David
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