What do you think?Ahmadinejad said-
"We believe that on the basis of
law and justice,
we can better lead the world"
Henry speaks
""Both sides of the Atlantic should put their best minds together on how to deal with the common danger of a wider war merging into a war of civilizations against the background of a nuclear-armed Middle East.""
Some U.N. Facts
via-
ANNE BAYEFSKY"Today marks the opening of the 61st annual session of the United Nations General Assembly. But just yesterday we were marking a turning point in a war that threatens the lives of decent people all over the world — a war that we cannot afford to lose.
after 9/11 the U.N. created a new body to take the lead on responding to terrorist threats — the Security Council's Counter-Terrorism Committee. To this day, the CTC has never named a single terrorist, terrorist organization, or state sponsor of terrorism.
The U.N.'s top human rights body for six decades, the Commission on Human Rights, was charged with identifying and responding to human rights abuse. During that time, 30% of all its resolutions condemning a specific state for human rights violations were directed at Israel, while not one resolution was adopted condemning states like China, Syria, or Zimbabwe. In recent years, Libya served as Chair.
America has tried to galvanize legal and political forces by calling the millions dead, displaced, and dying in Sudan "genocide." But the U.N. reported last year that events in Darfur didn't meet their criteria for genocide.
America has named Hezbollah a terrorist organization. But the U.N. refuses to do so — notwithstanding the 3,900 missiles directed at Israeli civilians this summer.
America has sought repeatedly to put Chinese violations of the civil rights of a billion people on the U.N. agenda. But all such attempts have been defeated by maneuvers that take draft resolutions off the table before they can even be put to a vote.
America attempted to introduce minimal qualifications for membership on the Human Rights Council relating to actual human rights performance. The General Assembly rejected the idea out-of-hand.
Opponents of such reform include U.N. staffers like the secretary-general and his deputy, who claim they are hapless functionaries operating at the mercy of member states — notwithstanding self-motivated trips to Iran, handshakes with Hezbollah, "doing business" with Saddam Hussein, and blaming middle American ignorance for the credibility gap. They are the 45 "Not Free" nations — to use Freedom House labels — who pass judgment on others in the General Assembly. These are the state sponsors of terrorism. The ones who don't let women vote or drive, or who kill them in the name of "honor." The ones who raise their children to die while murdering as many others of a different faith as possible. The ones who shoot mothers and babies from behind. The ones who claim that authoring a cartoon, a movie, or a book can justify a death sentence.
There is an alternative, an antidote to the self-doubt and moral relativism planted in our midst by Turtle Bay. Senator Frist calls it a "council of democracies outside of the U.N. system … [that would] truly monitor, examine and expose human rights abuses around the globe." Such a gathering is an idea whose time has come: the United Democratic Nations — an international organization of democracies, by democracies, and for democracies. It is time to say enough.
"
PHOTOGRAPH FROM SEPTEMBER 11
They jumped from the burning floors
one, two, a few more,
higher, lower.
The photograph halted them in life,
and now keeps them
above the earth toward the earth.
Each is still complete,
with a particular face
and blood well hidden.
There’s enough time
for hair to come loose,
for keys and coins
to fall from pockets.
They’re still within the air’s reach,
within the compass of places
that have just now opened.
I can do only two things for them
describe this flight
and not add a last line.
