NationStates Jolt Archive

Despite the fact that your men are being slaughtered, your women are being rounded up and gang-raped by arab militias to produce lighter skinned people, and your villages are being driven from the arable farmland they have lived on for generations into the wilderness, the UN has determined you are not experiencing a genocide. So that's good news, isn't it?

True to form, the UN is once again encouraging the most terrible in human nature.

Ask the people in the former Yugoslavia how efficient the UN was at arriving in time to help people.

Or ask some Rwandans.

We could have asked the 300,000 people shot into open pits in Iraq by their own leader, but the UN has never acknowledged that this even happened, and the hectares of bones aren't able to speak.

Come to think of it, they didn't do anything about the Khmer Rouge massacres, either.

The UN is incapable of stopping anything except a slice of money out of a corrupt aid program. That slice goes into their own pockets. As for its effectiveness at stopping anything else, they are really good at stopping anyone from doing anything. If we went now and helped the people of Darfur, Europeans would accuse the US of doing something without UN approval.

So, I'm sure that the Europeans would like for the Sudanese in Darfur to quietly expire. They should see that God is trying to kill them, and they should have the good manners to line up in neat rows so that the Sudanese militias can more easily shoot them and hack them to death.

What in the Name of the Lord is the UN THINKING?

What is going on in Darfur is Genocide!!! Nothing less! If this is what the UN is thinking, then I think it is time to come up with a new organization!

According to UN rules if the UN doesn't label it genocide it isn't compelled to take action against Sudan.

Yes, it IS time for a new organisation...the UN is completely corrupt and well, let's say it...pathetic. We need a democratic organisation with NO veto power, and one that does not allow a small group of countries to dictate international policy. One country, one vote (unless we plan on using representation by population which would just swing things in favour of China and India...). Each country pays dues based on their national GNP, and each nation 'donates' soldiers to be used in an international peace-keeping force that actually GOES OUT AND KEEPS SOME DAMN PEACE!

I guess they'll only call it a genocide once it's been completed.

According to UN rules if the UN doesn't label it genocide it isn't compelled to take action against Sudan.

And many more people will die and the world will scream that that US isn't doing anything about it.

Yea, now we'll be on the receiving end of more anger. Well guess what. It is the UNs Responsiblity to take care of this. If they do not then it proves that the UN just doesn't care at all about the state of the world.

According to UN rules if the UN doesn't label it genocide it isn't compelled to take action against Sudan.

That's convenient. Obviously not something the US agrees with, because Powell said it was genocide when he visited there.

Must be the other members of the Security Council. You know, the ones who want to stretch the Geneva Conventions to apply to non-signatories who don't follow the Conventions, and want "enemy combatants" to be "prisoners of war" even when the Conventions explicitly say that's not so.

Looks like some selective reading of the word "genocide" by some Europeans.

The Americans have only had experience with the Native Americans on the genocide front. Europeans have had a lot more experience at it, and I surmise that's the reason that Sudan isn't a genocide.

Maybe that's what we did wrong in Afghanistan. If we had just committed genocide instead of rounding up a few hundred enemy combatants in Guantanamo - if we had just shot every man, woman, and child there, the UN would probably have overlooked the whole thing until we were actually finished.

Of course, if we left a handful of people alive, then it wouldn't be defined by the UN as genocide.

I guess one question that should be asked is, who profits from this at the UN? That's clearly what drives the body, now. Corruption and profits from any sanctions that might or might not be in place.

My guess is that this time it is China and Russia that have stopped the word genocide from appearing in the UN report. Both countries have strong economic interests in Sudan.

As long as there are countries in the Security Council with veto rights and not willing to follow UN resolutions (including the US that has rejected resolutions on Israel and Central America in the past, and prevented the UN from taking action in Rwanda) the UN will continue to be an uneffective body.

A reform of the UN is needed, but to give it real influence the powers will have to give it real authority and power, and I'm pretty sure none of them will want to do that.

Yes, it IS time for a new organisation...the UN is completely corrupt and well, let's say it...pathetic. We need a democratic organisation with NO veto power, and one that does not allow a small group of countries to dictate international policy. One country, one vote (unless we plan on using representation by population which would just swing things in favour of China and India...). Each country pays dues based on their national GNP, and each nation 'donates' soldiers to be used in an international peace-keeping force that actually GOES OUT AND KEEPS SOME DAMN PEACE!

I guess they'll only call it a genocide once it's been completed.
One country, one vote? Hardly. Unless it's one country, 1% of the budget. One country, 1% of the peacekeeping forces. Etc., etc.

Any old reason to throw insults at the UN?
Sudan's government and the Arab Janjaweed militia are not guilty of genocide, but committed mass killings, torture, rape and other crimes meriting trial before the international criminal court (ICC), a UN report said today.

Although the US has described the killings in Sudan's western Darfur region as genocide, the report by a UN-appointed panel of five lawyers said there was no clear evidence meeting the legal definition of genocide, which means there is intent to destroy a population group.

However, the report said the atrocities committed in Darfur were horrific, with some probably amounting to war crimes. The lawyers stressed the fact that they were not calling the attacks genocide should not be interpreted as detracting from their gravity.

The UN report spread the blame for the violence and other crimes among the government, the militias - alleged to have been backed by the government - and the region's rebels.

The lawyers have compiled a list of suspects encompassing government officials, militia members, rebels, and "certain foreign army officers acting in their personal capacity". The names had not been made public to ensure that due process was carried out and to protect witnesses, the UN said.

Its call for the use of the ICC, the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal, sets up a possible showdown with Washington, which opposes the court and has called for trials under the aegis of the African Union instead. White House officials fear that the ICC, based in The Hague, could be used for politically motivated prosecutions of US troops.

The UN report said there had been systematic violence and "there was no military necessity for the destruction and devastation caused". The targets were "exclusively civilian", it said.

<snip>http://www.guardian.co.uk/sudan/story/0,14658,1403309,00.html

One country, one vote? Hardly. Unless it's one country, 1% of the budget. One country, 1% of the peacekeeping forces. Etc., etc.
Then how should the votes be divied up? If people don't pay their dues, should they keep their vote (in that case, the US wouldn've been kicked out long ago:))?

No, really...what do you think would work in terms of votes?

The other thing the UN would have to give up is this central idea of the sovereignty of individual nations, which it is bound to respect (it's in writing).

On the day that all nations give up their individual sovereignty to a central world government, then you'll have an effective body.

Until then, get used to watching someone stupid like Kofi Annan on television switching from one hand up his own ass to another.

Then how should the votes be divied up? If people don't pay their dues, should they keep their vote (in that case, the US wouldn've been kicked out long ago:))?

No, really...what do you think would work in terms of votes?
I think a big part would be to not let every despotic, genocidal country join. Syria on the human right's commission? What?

I think a big part would be to not let every despotic, genocidal country join. Syria on the human right's commission? What?
I absolutely think every country should join and have a vote, no matter how despotic. How can you hold a country to an international standard if they aren't part of your international organisation? And who would determine which nations were 'unfit' for this new and improved UN? Let them join, but be prepared to intervene in cases of genocide (as an international body, not unilaterally).

I agree with Whispering Legs that sovereignty is an issue that must be addressed. It is problematic to allow an international organisation to supercede sovereignty and intervene directly in 'domestic affairs'. That is why I think the regulations and definitions have to be very well thought out and democratically adopted. We already have nations who do not respect the sovereignty of some countries, while ignoring other nations in crisis. We should not let individual nations make these decisions. The current UN is terrible at getting anything done, and I'm not saying a one nation, one vote would inherently be any better, but the rest of the world should have a say in what is going on too. It would be a legal nightmare, but we should be trying to do SOMETHING better rather than sticking with the pathetic remnants of a glee club that we call the UN.

As the legal definition of genocide is the intent to completely eradicate a group of people, besides Powell using that word can somebody here point me to a reputable link that shows such an intent?


I mean, as long as you are slamming the UN for saying "It's nasty shit that needs dealing with but it ain't genocide", please comment as to why it really IS genocide (besides a quote from the guy who also told the UN that Iraq really had WMD in that bunker right there in the pictures. )


I stated yesterday that the world inaction on this issue was deplorable, however if you are going to slam the UN administration for a specific syntactic definition, then please give a source as to why they were incorrect. I think it would be better to direct your bitching at the correct problems which are those members of the security council who are not getting behind action inthe Sudan rather than the administration of the UN who has no say in such things.

And for the record, I DO subscribe the the US position which is that the Sudan needs military intervention to fix this issue - and needs it yesterday! And I think that most Canadians feel that way. Unfortunately we don't have the manpower to commit right now due to the heavy (for us) rotations we have been doing in Kabul.

Zepp, what's your opinion on how we could improve the UN and possibly get action going in situations like this?

I think a big part would be to not let every despotic, genocidal country join. Syria on the human right's commission? What?

And SUDAN is the CHAIRMAN of said commission!

As the legal definition of genocide is the intent to completely eradicate a group of people, besides Powell using that word can somebody here point me to a reputable link that shows such an intent?

Here you go!

http://www.savedarfur.org/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3918765.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3641820.stm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64425-2005Jan10.html
http://www.genocidewatch.org/SudanTwelveWaysToDenyAGenocidebyGregStanton.htm

This should suffice for now. Read especially the last link!

True to form, the UN is once again encouraging the most terrible in human nature.

Ask the people in the former Yugoslavia how efficient the UN was at arriving in time to help people.

Or ask some Rwandans.

We could have asked the 300,000 people shot into open pits in Iraq by their own leader, but the UN has never acknowledged that this even happened, and the hectares of bones aren't able to speak.

Come to think of it, they didn't do anything about the Khmer Rouge massacres, either.

The UN is incapable of stopping anything except a slice of money out of a corrupt aid program. That slice goes into their own pockets. As for its effectiveness at stopping anything else, they are really good at stopping anyone from doing anything. If we went now and helped the people of Darfur, Europeans would accuse the US of doing something without UN approval.

So, I'm sure that the Europeans would like for the Sudanese in Darfur to quietly expire. They should see that God is trying to kill them, and they should have the good manners to line up in neat rows so that the Sudanese militias can more easily shoot them and hack them to death.

Why stop there.. the UN identified ethnic cleansing in Bosnia yet it could do nothing... and solved the genocide of IRAQ with 12 years of sanctions in which corruption ran rampent.. (funny who is blamed ? the US .. even though France was the big winner in that corruption scandel )

So what is the point of the UN anymore ?

Zepp, what's your opinion on how we could improve the UN and possibly get action going in situations like this?

I think that the current limited group of five with ultimate power to decide security issues is to locked in existing politics, and the single-country veto option needs to be addressed. Also, there is always the issue of who has to go in and do the job. Currently the western world is abdicating it's responsibilities all to often and it is third-world armies picking up the slack because their country gets a break on UN dues - often with poorer results than might be possible otherwise.

If the permanent membership got increased to 15 with five rotating members from other countries, then you could implement a system whereby diferent vote thresholds needed to be met for certain results.

e.g) 15 of 20 to get economic sanctions and 18 of 20 for military intervention.

Or something along those lines. I'm not absolutely sure of what the better size membership should be or about the rotating membership idea either as there are too many chances of winding up with a bad group of five dictatorships aboard. But the current group of five is obviously unworkable, and to get all five votes too many resolutions have been watered down to buy off a holdout.

Regarding the issue of who does the work, I think that a lottery (or rotational) system needs to be in play where each country that wants to be involved in the UN puts up a certain chunk of their military to be available for UN duty. If a need for peacekeeping is voted on, and it's your turn to get your hands dirty then there is no shirking your responsibility. You go. Members of the security council will be required to be more active in this regard as they are the ones voting upon such actions. So for the shirkers out there, if you don't want to be active in solving the problems, don't get active in thinking that you have a say in deciding about them. Member nations may, therefore choose not to be involved in the security council should they so choose. But abdicating from the security council while living under it's benefits should not give you a free pass either. There should be a financial disincentive for UN membership without obligation.

Actually, I kind of prefer the lottery idea as people would have to vote their conscience before finding out if they need to put their soldiers where their mouths are.



No matter what there will never be a perfect system as self-interest between countries and elected officials is always a factor. But the existing system clearly needs to find ways to work faster and more effectively.

Here you go!

http://www.savedarfur.org/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3918765.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3641820.stm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64425-2005Jan10.html
http://www.genocidewatch.org/SudanTwelveWaysToDenyAGenocidebyGregStanton.htm

This should suffice for now. Read especially the last link!


I did. Now then, the legal definition of Genocide noted therin includes the phrase "in whole or in part", which in this case would support a notion of genocide. Checking the UNHCHR I concur that this is the exact phrasing of that convention.

And clearly, as I have mentioned, I support action in the Sudan.

What I found most interesting in that last article though was the following text:


A. Among journalists, the general public, diplomats, and lawyers who haven’t read the Genocide Convention, there is a common misconception that a finding of genocide would legally require action to suppress it. Under this misconception, having been informed that the U.S. would take no action in Rwanda in 1994, State Department lawyers ordered avoidance of the word. They made their legal conclusion fit the Procrustean bed of U.S. policy. They committed legal malpractice.

Unfortunately, the Genocide Convention carries no such legal compulsion to act. It legally requires only that states-parties pass national laws against genocide and then prosecute or extradite those who commit the crime. Article VIII of the Convention says they also “may call upon the competent organs of the United Nations to take such action under the Charter of the United Nations as they consider appropriate for the prevention and suppression of acts of genocide.” But they aren’t legally required to do so. Article I of the Genocide Convention creates a moral obligation to prevent genocide, but it does not dictate military intervention or any other particular measures.



So then, if the Genocide Convention does NOT compel the UN to act, then surely this then dismisses the initial claim of the originating post which is that the UN report refused to call it genocide to avoid having to act.

So, given that (according to your links) failing to call it genocide would no more compel the UN to act than if they did call it genocide, then the political motivations being put forth for this report just evaporated. Which is to say that this in-depth investigation had no reason not to call it genocidea s it would not have mattered, and so their decision that it was not genocide was the true and impartial results of their investigation.

Well, that or your last link is wrong on this basic fact which then throws all of it into a pretty dim light as being of suspect quality.

None of that would ever pass.

The worst part would be the lottery thing for providing military service.

Most militaries aren't worth spit.

Technically, the US can get the job done faster, quicker, with fewer civilian casualties.

Few other nations have the logistical train, the sophisticated weapons, or the willingness to expend them. Most militaries have, at least from the US perspective, become lucrative targets that won't exist in the second week of a real war.

Most nations, presented with such a lottery, would probably slash their defense budgets.

The poor assumption made by the UN is that it is composed of peers. It most definitely is not.

The EU had to get its individual nations at a relative economic peer level before unification could work.

The UN is nowhere near close.

I think that the major nations of the world (probably the G-8 as a start) would be better off forming its own organization and funding a common military. They would probably share major economic objectives at the very least.

Also, you just can't randomly combine military forces from different countries. Most have no ability to interoperate or communicate. The US at this time has trouble communicating with NATO forces in combat because most EU nations haven't spent the money to upgrade their radios. And forget communicating with a third-world military.

I think the UN should be dissolved. I think the idea of a combination of the EU, US, Russia, China, Japan, and India (and a few other major developing nations) would be a good idea. They would have to form a military alliance first - and assure interoperability - at the same time as forming an economic alliance. After that, the political commonality would follow - and the rest of the world would have to obey.

If you think that defying the US military is impossible - defying such an alliance would be absolutely impossible. If they told you to stop massacring your own people, you would have to stop, or face a fairly rapid invasion and occupation.

None of that would ever pass.

The worst part would be the lottery thing for providing military service.

Most militaries aren't worth spit.


You're right. And right now those are the countries volunteering peacekeepers to get a break on their dues. The western countries lobby for peacekeeping efforts and then abdicate their responsibility.

Technically, the US can get the job done faster, quicker, with fewer civilian casualties.


Except that technically they don't. The political will for such things in your country when not clearly demonstrable to be in your national interest was weak after Korea, poor after Vietnam, and nonexistant by the time Lebannon and Somalia had passed. Even now the general complaint about the Sudan is: "This is horrid, Somebody ELSE should go do something. We would, but we're busy"

You can;t afford to police the whole world. No single country can. That is why you need ways to get others to step up to the plate.

Few other nations have the logistical train, the sophisticated weapons, or the willingness to expend them. Most militaries have, at least from the US perspective, become lucrative targets that won't exist in the second week of a real war.


And few peacekeeping tasks require all of those things. Putting people on the ground in harms way with the promise of retaiation if those people get harmed is usually enough.


Most nations, presented with such a lottery, would probably slash their defense budgets.


Mos countries still have their national interests to defend.

The poor assumption made by the UN is that it is composed of peers. It most definitely is not.

The EU had to get its individual nations at a relative economic peer level before unification could work.

The UN is nowhere near close.


Agreed. However that doesn't change the current situation where there are things like the Sudan happening with no-one stepping up to the plate. The lottery lets people vote, and then somebody HAS to go. Right now even after a resolution it sometimes takes a long time (and a lot of lives) before enough countries volunteer to chip in. This setup clearly does not force a response.


I think that the major nations of the world (probably the G-8 as a start) would be better off forming its own organization and funding a common military. They would probably share major economic objectives at the very least.


Won' happen. Why? Because each and every one of them refuses to put their own people under the command of someone else. The US won't, and the others won't go along with what would look to their citizens like them providing bodies for a larger US-commanded force. Surely you can see how that would not fly in Britain just as it would not fly in the US if it turned out that a foreigner was to head up the military.

US troops will never go into the field under anything but an American commander. To suggest otherwise would get an American leader tarred and feathered.

*Newsflash* - you aren't the only country who feels that way.



Also, you just can't randomly combine military forces from different countries. Most have no ability to interoperate or communicate. The US at this time has trouble communicating with NATO forces in combat because most EU nations haven't spent the money to upgrade their radios. And forget communicating with a third-world military.


Oh c'mon. It was worked out in WWI, WWII, Korea, Desert Storm, Afganistan, IRaq.... it CAN be done if there is the will. Indeed, it IS done today as it is generally thrid world countries doing the work - often under a command structure from a western country. e.g. the Kenyan troops operating under Dallaire in Rwanda.

I think the UN should be dissolved. I think the idea of a combination of the EU, US, Russia, China, Japan, and India (and a few other major developing nations) would be a good idea. They would have to form a military alliance first - and assure interoperability - at the same time as forming an economic alliance. After that, the political commonality would follow - and the rest of the world would have to obey.


Overly optimistic and simplistic. After all, this very coalition you name would have still refused to work with you in Iraq. They still comprise the permanent members of the security council who aren't doing shit about the Sudan now. What guarantee do you have that your rebranding with a smaller group will change their minds?


If you think that defying the US military is impossible - defying such an alliance would be absolutely impossible. If they told you to stop massacring your own people, you would have to stop, or face a fairly rapid invasion and occupation.


And if all those people agree with the US on a matter of principle today then they still provide the same unified front on that given issue as they would as members of yuor smaller group.

What you have failed to do is give any procedureal reason why your smaller group would be any more likely to agree and to work well together than they currently do in the UN.

For the same reason that the G-8 and NATO work better than the UN.

Who actually intervened in Kosovo first? NATO or the UN?

If you compose the membership of a small group of elite nations, they are more likely to decide to do something than some crap organization that is full of crap nations.

We might not have gone in on Iraq if that alliance had been in place. Not just because the others wouldn't go along, but because that alliance would have a value of its own.

Being a member of the UN doesn't have a demonstrable value to the US.

It's also possible to make the militaries operate under common command if you give them a common mission like NATO.

Maybe we could start by slowly expanding NATO and redefining its mission.

I absolutely think every country should join and have a vote, no matter how despotic. How can you hold a country to an international standard if they aren't part of your international organisation? And who would determine which nations were 'unfit' for this new and improved UN? Let them join, but be prepared to intervene in cases of genocide (as an international body, not unilaterally).
Because there is no international standard if you let everyone make it. Sudan's standard is considerably lower than the U.S., than Canada, than the E.U. If the other countries don't like it, nuts to them, we don't need to make every dictator feel warm and fuzzy.