A
Jesuit in NY
on Syria Notes
Saudi But
Neither Qatar
Nor the Ben
Ali Role
of UN
Peacekeeping
Chief
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
August 6 --
When Jesuit
Paolo
Dall'Oglio
took questions
from
a small press
conference in
the Millennium
Hotel across
First Avenue
on the UN
Monday
morning, he
called for a
new diplomatic
initiative
on Syria to
both Russia
"and NATO."
Inner
City Press
asked
Dall'Oglio
about the role
of Qatar and
Saudi Arabia.
He replied
that yes,
Saudi Arabia's
"project" was
to beat
Iran in Syria.
He noted that
some might
like a long
civil war in
Syria, and
speculated
that even if
Damascus
falls,
fighting may
continue to
break off the
Western or
Alawite zone
by the sea, on
the
theory there
is enough
natural gas
there to make
autonomy
viable.
But
Dall'Oglio did
not say a word
about Qatar.
Inner
City Press tweeted
out a photo of
Dall'Oglio
along with
this portion
of
his non-answer.
Replies ranged
from
questioning
why he was
under
the "rebel"
flag -- he
called it the
flag of the
"New
Syria" -- to stories
of Christian
martyrs killed
by Syria
rebels
to, who is he?
Dall'Oglio
seems
to have faith
that a
"post-Assad"
UN
Peacekeeping
mission could
be even handed
-- ignoring
the fact that
UN
Peacekeeping
is run by a
Herve Ladsous
long in the
French foreign
service, from
defending the
Hutu
government in
Rwanda in 1994
to
arranging the
flights of
Michele
Aliot-Marie on
planes owned
by
cronies of
Tunisian
dictator Ben
Ali in 2011.
Even handed?
Inner
City Press has
previously
covered other
Jesuits,
including
liberation
theologicals
from Latin
America. When
these called
for class war,
not
even regime
change, they
were ordered
to be quiet
and generally
complied. And
here?
Dall'Oglio
went
to Canada to
meet with
foreign
minister
Baird; he went
and spoke
in Vancouver
and now here,
to a small
audience
dominated by
Italian
and Saudi
media, along
with an
on-camera
question from
Voice of
America.
In
a sense, after
Kofi Annan's
resignation
and before the
anticipated
kill-off of
the UN
observer
mission, he
functions to
keep the spin
wheels
turning. And
so, not
without
interest, we
turn them.
Watch
this site.
, 
