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WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The member states of the United Nations today took a first step toward approving a treaty that could save hundreds of thousands of lives each year by controlling the global arms trade. Meeting in New York City today, the First Committee of the General Assembly voted to study the feasibility, scope and draft parameters for a comprehensive, legally binding agreement establishing common international standards for the import, export and transfer of conventional arms. The United States was the only country to vote no on the resolution. "The world is awash with weapons, including an...

War In The Middle East: U.N. peacekeepers may have done more than just look the other way as Hezbollah created its armed state within a state. The blue helmets may have served as Hezbollah's military intelligence. Real-time battlefield intelligence is a keystone of 21st century warfare, especially when you're up against a terrorist enemy that has had six years to construct hardened underground bunkers and tunnels from which to fight while not having to obey the rules of war. The situation gets complicated and your task becomes harder when that real-time intelligence is being provided to that enemy, Hezbollah, by...

Predictably, the United Nations has begun its appeasement of Hezbollah by asking Israel to lift its blockade of Lebanese sea and Air ports. This is an affront to the Israelis as the United Nations has not implemented all the elements of the cease fire agreement and no attempts have been made to disarm Hezbollah. If the United Nations had its way, Israel would open the door to a flood of weapons to rearm Hezbollah terrorists and seal their own fate in the process. This is a classic example of the diplomacy that has characterized the United Nations and demonstrates why...

The UN mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) is investigating new allegations implicating UN peacekeepers in the "sexual exploitation of minors," it has said. "MONUC has received allegations about the existence of a major prostitution ring involving minors, close to a large concentration of Congolese soldiers and Blue Helmets (UN forces) in South Kivu, (in the) northeast of the Democratic Republic of Congo," the UN mission said in a statement Thursday. The statement did not mention the nationalities of the peacekeepers implicated, but the spokeswoman, Sylvie van den Wildenberg, said the region had UN troops from India, Pakistan,...

For many years the United Nations has had their eye upon the guns of the worlds’ citizens. Socialists and Communists know from experience that removing guns from the people is the best way to remove their freedom. Americans know from experience that we needed our arms to win our freedom and that we had better keep them if we are to remain free! The Associated Press reported in 1994, "So quietly that even the gun lobby hasn’t noticed, the United Nations is beginning to set its sights on global gun control." U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan reported to the General Assembly...

WASHINGTON, July 3 (UPI) -- New Zealand is sending a delegation to New York this week to "strongly support" an arms trade treaty under discussion at the United Nations. Newire.co.nz reported on June 27 that Phil Alpers was leading the New Zealand contingent -- which will assist in presenting the "Million Faces" petition to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan -- to the discussions, which opened Monday. Alpers helped found the 700-member International Action Network for Small Arms. The petition includes one million photos of people around the world calling for a halt to small arms proliferation, including 12,000 New Zealanders. Alpers...

The UN's "Borderless" WorldBy Joseph KleinFrontPageMagazine.com | April 24, 2006 While pro-immigrant rallies get most of the attention from the mainstream press, many law-abiding American citizens are fed up with the reality of tens of thousands of foreign nationals every few weeks continuing to enter this country illegally through our porous borders, added to the more than 11 million illegal aliens who are already here.  Americans are bearing a grossly disproportionate share of the security risks and economic costs associated with such migration, which makes it a national problem for Americans to solve through their elected representatives and through voluntary...

Code: ZE05110406 Date: 2005-11-04 Sustainable Development a Responsibility, Says Vatican Archbishop Migliore Warns U.N. of Future Challenges NEW YORK, NOV. 4, 2005 (Zenit.org).- For the Holy See the promotion of sustainable development is a question of responsibility and solidarity vis-à-vis present and future generations. The Holy See's permanent observer to the United Nations, Archbishop Celestino Migliore, made these comment Thursday in an address to the U.N. General Assembly's Commission on Sustainable Development. "My delegation believes that development plans and poverty reduction strategies must be integrated into environmental sustainability," said the papal representative. "Without environmental stewardship, development will have no sound...

UNITED Nations chief Kofi Annan was embroiled in another huge row last night after secret changes were made to a report linking Syria to the murder of Lebanon’s ex-PM. Family members of Syria’s President Bashar Assad were implicated in the killings — but dropped from a printed version of the UN report. Amazingly, the deletions were spotted when an electronic version was issued by mistake. Computer experts said the crucial changes were made while the report’s author was meeting Secretary General Annan. The report alleged Maher Assad — brother of President Assad — plotted the killing of Rafik Hariri and...

United Nations Day, 2005 A Proclamation by the President of the United States of America Sixty years ago, the United Nations was created to spread hope and liberty, fight poverty and disease, and help secure human rights and human dignity for people everywhere. On United Nations Day, we recommit ourselves to the ideals on which this organization was founded. Throughout history, the human spirit has been tested by the forces of darkness and evil. Since its founding in the aftermath of World War II, the United Nations has worked to solve problems and harness the best instincts of humankind. Today,...

UNITED NATIONS The United Nations must do more to ensure its peacekeepers follow new rules against sex abuse, according to a new report by an independent refugee organization that found a "boys will be boys" culture still prevails in many military missions. The report released Tuesday by Refugees International – "Must Boys Be Boys? Ending Sexual Exploitation and Abuse in U.N. Peacekeeping Missions" – said a "hyper-masculine culture" has evolved among peacekeepers who bond together and erect a "wall of silence" to shield themselves from outside criticism. The U.N. instituted a policy of zero tolerance of sex abuse and zero...

Expect world leaders to dodge some scheduled United Nations sessions today in a rush to attend the opening round of the Clinton Global Initiative, where 750 global glitterati and their aides have converged on the Sheraton New York Hotel and Towers – at $15,000 per head – to forge a "new level" of global cooperation. The former U.S. president has sought openly a post-presidential position commensurate with his vision, hoping to use his "clout, connections and charisma" on behalf of the global community. A South China Morning Post headline captures the mood: "His plans are grand, but can he save...

good or evil: who decides?Dr. Raymond DeSouza Who decides what is good or evil? The state? Society? The individual? Join Dr. Raymond De Souza as he teaches about the Natural Law and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church.Contact:Dr. Raymond De Souza http://saintgabriel.com.au PO Box 111 Western Australia 6058 Telephone:[61] 08 9202 1300  Back to Series List

   http://www.news.com/Will the U.N. run the Internet? By Declan McCullagh Story last modified Mon Jul 11 04:00:00 PDT 2005 An international political spat is brewing over whether the United Nations will seize control of the heart of the Internet. U.N. bureaucrats and telecommunications ministers from many less-developed nations claim the U.S. government has undue influence over how things run online. Now they want to be the ones in charge. While the formal proposal from a U.N. working group will be released July 18, it's already clear what it will contain. A preliminary summary of governmental views claims there's a...

"If and when these reforms are enacted, Mr. Speaker, the world will be safer and stronger, the American people will be assured their money is being well-spent, and the United Nations charter to prevent wars, protect human rights, and advance the cause of human freedom will be reaffirmed." So declared House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) on June 17 in his concluding remarks in support of H.R. 2745, the United Nations Reform Act of 2005. It must be tempting indeed for a great many folks to believe that merely passing a piece of legislation could transform the United Nations from...

UN tackles sex abuse by troops Changes include a new code of conduct for peacekeepers and monitors within each mission. NEW YORK – Since accusations of sexual abuse by peacekeepers in Congo arose a year ago, the United Nations has taken vigorous measures to address a problem that has dogged it for years. Consider: • Since Jan. 1, 2004, the UN has investigated 152 cases of alleged sexual violations - dismissing five UN staff and sending home 77 military personnel and national police from their missions, including six commanders. • The UN Security Council held its first-ever meeting on May...

You Can't Reform a Deadly Disease A thinking person who discovers a tumor attacking a vital organ will quickly find a surgeon to cut it out. Only someone bereft of his senses will continue to feed the growth and assume that it will not hurt him. Likewise, a thinking person will not try to "reform" an institutional entity that has no worth. He will shut it down. Any careful reading of the Charter of the United Nations should lead one to the conclusion that the world body is to our nation what a cancerous tumor is to a human being....

In the Herbst Theater auditorium in San Francisco, delegates from 50 nations sign the United Nations Charter, establishing the world body as a means of saving "succeeding generations from the scourge of war." The Charter was ratified on October 24, and the first U.N. General Assembly met in London on January 10, 1946. Despite the failure of the League of Nations in arbitrating the conflicts that led up to World War II, the Allies as early as 1941 proposed establishing a new international body to maintain peace in the postwar world. The idea of the United Nations began to be...

As millions of children look forward to a break from school, millions of oth­ers only wish they could begin. For these children, summer days will not be spent in ballparks and play­grounds, but on battlegrounds or in fields. These children have no time for play. It's all work. And the work is dirty, hard and dangerous. According to the International Labor Organization's (www.ilo.org) global report, "A Future Without Child Labor," 246 million children worldwide are in­volved in child labor, which should be abolished. The study found that 179 mil­lion children ages 5 to 17 are exposed to forms of child...

Saying that the Joint Chiefs and combatant commanders “strongly support” ratification of the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST), General Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has stated that the measure “ensures the ability of the US Armed Forces to operate freely across the vast expanse of the world’s oceans under the authority of widely recognized and accepted international law.” [1] But would our military leaders support the treaty if they knew that the activists behind it were also instrumental in promoting the International Criminal Court (ICC), which could prosecute and imprison American troops and military...