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Posted on 09/04/2001 7:40:51 AM PDT by xsysmgr
THE United Nations had it coming to it. Last month, Colin Powell, the black American Secretary of State, decided to send only low-level representation to Durban for its World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.The reason for his decision was the gathering's manifest purpose: a ganging-up against the West and Israel in the form of demands for an apology and reparations for slavery and colonialism, and an indictment of Israel as one of the leading practitioners of racism and ethnic cleansing. Since the meeting began on Friday, Mr Powell's worst fears can only have been confirmed. Yesterday, he announced that the United States was pulling out of Durban after failing to remove "hateful" anti-Israeli language from the conference documents. Israel, which also sent a junior delegation, has followed suit.
Mr Powell's view of the meeting is worth quoting at some length: " I know that you do not combat racism by a conference that produces declarations containing hateful language, some of which is a throwback to the days of 'Zionism equals racism', or supports the idea that we have made too much of the Holocaust or suggests that apartheid exists in Israel or that singles out only one country in the world, Israel, for censure and abuse."
This wretched conference is attempting to set the clock back to before 1991, when the UN General Assembly's resolution on Zionism and racism was repealed. It is putting in the dock Western nations which gave to the world the notion that racism and xenophobia are wrong. That is not to say that they are free of such ills. But it is pretty rich to be publicly pilloried at what purports to be an anti-racism conference by the likes of anti-Semitic Syria and a Zimbabwean regime that seeks to blame all its ills on the white minority and Britain, the old colonial power. The UN thoroughly deserves the disgust it has inspired in Washington and has only itself to blame if it now makes no headway in persuading the Americans to pay their $2.3 billion arrears to its funds.
The British Government, which has rightly resisted demands to apologise for the transatlantic slave trade, is nevertheless staying in Durban to the end. Tomorrow, Angela Eagle, a Home Office minister, will take over the baton from Baroness Amos, her Foreign Office equivalent, who left yesterday. After the hypocritical cant it has had to endure over the past four days, there is no good reason why Britain should stay. Tony Blair should brush aside the wish of Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, to maintain representation at all costs, and pull our delegation out. Racism is an evil but the Durban conference is an insane way to confront it.
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"We'll give you millions of dollars and let you play toy Hitler in exchange for your being just a teensy-bit less homocidal and destructive." This may be the grand-daddy of opportunity cost damage management.
Wrong, that should be "1945".
The countries that scream the loudest and shake their fingers at other countries are usually the ones who are the most guilty themselves. Just who the hell do the Zimbabweans think they are, to shake their finger at the U.S.? And the Syrians? Fuggedaboutit!
Oh, I forgot--this is the same U.N. that kicked the U.S. off the Council on Human Rights by secret ballot and rolled out the red carpet for the Sudanese and the Libyans!
Thanks for posting the article. It's nice to know that there are at least some British columnists who haven't gone barking mad.
This isn't just a columnist; it's a House Editorial representing the position of The Telegraph.
Siberia would be a good spot for it.
True. The BBC has an article on the conference, but it is more about the reaction to the US and Isreal's leaving, than on the leaving itself. For a view from the UK left, I posted a Leader [House Editorial] from The Guardian .
It starts out
It is a great shame that the conference - which had such ambitious, bold and noble aims - should have been thus diverted.and ends
If this UN summit helps by raising individual consciousness, as well as by stirring collective conscience, all may not yet be lost.Pretty namby-pamby, trying to make something positive out of this fiasco.
Actually Israel and the US are going after straw men again ... much of the criticism against Israel comes not from Muslim fundamentalists or rabid anti-Semites, as we are led to believe, but from ordinary people the world over who are horrified by Israeli policies and practices. Furthermore, Israel is getting labelled as racist because it meets all the technical requirements for such a label. People generally WANT to support Israel, but have to distance themselves from her bahaviour and actions, which are inexcusable. Furthermore, Israel and the US haven't come up with a single valid counterargument to the criticism levelled at them, instead they literally fled and fell back on their usual defense - drag the gammy corpse of "anti-Semitism" out of the grave and parade it about.
The fact that the US and Israel withdrew from the Conference on Racism only serves to prove that the US and Israel's position on Palestine has become indefensible. Israel's assertion of its "independence," its indifference to the world community is an irony given Jewish history. The American and Israeli delegations should have remained to answer the allegations.
By fleeing the conference they only served to isolate themselves from International opinion. The Bush administration's ability as a world leader and consensus builder is proving to be poor at best. The conference covers an important agenda for the world which will continue to focus international pressure on Israel to address the allegations of racism, and someday there may be sanctions against Israel if their response is deemed unsatisfactory.
By its own charter the United Nations is compelled to take a stand.
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