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From Sulfur to Formaldehyde, Latin Smells at UN as
D'Escoto Calls Gaza Meeting
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
January 8 -- As the Arab League
says it is calling for a vote Thursday afternoon on a Security Council
resolution on Gaza, the President of the General Assembly Miguel
d'Escoto
Brockmann is pushing forward with a plan for a special session of the
GA at
5:30 on Thursday. The UN smells like
formaldehyde, d'Escoto told the Press. He blamed US President George W.
Bush,
and also France's Nicolas Sarkozy. The Security Council is trying to
outsource
its responsibility to maintain peace and security, he said, referring
to Sarkozy's
telegenic trip to Cairo.
Inner City
Press asked d'Escoto which countries asked him to convene or continue
the
special meeting, and also if he had spoke with the Council's
non-permanent
members like Costa Rica, Mexico and Austria, who proposed and obtained
amendments
to Libya's draft resolution on Gaza. D'Escoto answered that he has
spoke with
the non-permanent members, and also some Permanents. He quoted from a
talk with
"Alexander Wolff" of the US, which he interpreted as a veto threat.
D'Escoto
was
seen speaking with Russia's Deputy Permanent Representative in the hall
on the
way to his press conference. But when asked by a New York Post
reporter,
insistently, to name a single country which had requested the special
meeting,
d'Escoto refused, saying he didn't like the question, and apparently
the
questioner. I am not going to answer, he said. The reporter stood up
and left
the press conference. And it was so easy to answer: Malaysia is on
record as
having requested the meeting...
D'Escoto's
sense of smell, that the Council is outdated and on mothballs, recalled
Venezuela's Hugo Chavez' line two years ago about smelling sulfur at
the podium
where George Bush had stood. Does the evolution of the Latin Group's
description
of the UN, from sulfur to formaldehyde, mean that in their view the
Devil has
been put on ice?
Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann with Evo Morales,
sense of smell not shown
Chavez, it
should be noted, has expelled Israel's Ambassador from Venezuela.
Nicaragua has
issued strong statements, but has yet to expel. Jordan's representative
was
asked why they have not followed suit, and grew heated and defensive.
NGOs like
Oxfam and World Vision had called for a suspension of the European
Union's
talks on upgrading their relationship with Israel. The smells are
everywhere.
D'Escoto
held up a photo of black-clad Jewish protestors calling an end to
Israel. He
asked, are they anti-Semitic? A reporter from Fox News pointed out that
these
protesters, also visible on Second Avenue and 42nd Street across from
the
Israeli mission to the UN, are a small minority. D'Escoto went on, in a
phrase
with a special history in the US, to say he has many friends who are
Jewish. He
asked rhetorically, "And aren't the Palestinians Semites?"
News analysis:
while D'Escoto's moves to reassert a
role for the General Assembly on issues blocked on the Security Council
-- not
only Palestine but, for example, Western Sahara -- are welcomed by
many. But his
refusal to even purport to answer questions that he didn't like shows a
different,
less attractive side. And the question was easy to answer -- Malaysia,
among
others. Since he only has nine months left, one hopes d'Escoto starts
naming
names, opening up heretofore closed meetings, quoting from diplomatic
talks.
We'll see.
Click here for Inner City Press'
review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner
City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press'
December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner
City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
Click here for Inner City
Press Nov. 7 debate on the war in Congo
Watch this site, and this Oct. 2 debate, on
UN, bailout, MDGs
and this October 17 debate, on
Security Council and Obama and the UN.
* * *
These
reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click
here
for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali
National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
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