|
At UN, Nicaraguan Priest Takes Helm and Swings
Left, New Cold War at the Movies, Georgia Story Re-Told in UN Basement
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
September 16 -- A priest has taken
the reins of the UN General Assembly, and Tuesday he preached peace and
love.
But Father Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann at his post-preach press
conference, when
Inner City Press asked the first question about what he will do to
defuse
what's been called the New Cold War, said that there are many more
serious
issues than Myanmar, Zimbabwe and Georgia, the ones Inner City Press
listed
from this summer.
Iraq,
d'Escoto said, do you know how many people have been killed there? He
cited the
Lancet, as he had to journalists throughout the week. When asked by
another
reporter if he equated Russia in Georgia with the U.S. in Iraq, as wars
of
aggression, d'Escoto touched his hearing aid and said he hadn't heard
right, was
the question if Georgia's entry into South Ossetia was an aggression
and
against the UN Charter. Of course, he said.
Far from holding both sides to account, Father
d'Escoto is a partisan on
the other side. Other questions are sure to arise
Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann looks up and the
left for his message
The same
reaction - formation was on display in the UN's basement, an hour
before
d'Escoto's speech. The Russian mission to the UN screened films of
devastation
in South Ossetia, one of them a Russia Today TV piece entitled
"Desolate
Mothers." The voice-over excused the views of the corpses of Georgia
soldiers being spat on, and the burning of ethnic Georgian's houses.
While
Georgia's presentations, given more prominent coverage on CNN and
elsewhere,
were equally one-sided, it surprised many that the Russian films were
screened
in the UN. Apparently its a privilege of being a Permanent Member of
the
Security Council. The new Cold War at the movies, one could call it.
A Russian
diplomat told Inner City Press that "the Europeans" had called his
mission to say they would not come to the film screening, just as they
wouldn't
go to a Georgian equivalent. Then again, if they have television sets
and live
in New York, they've seen the Georgian story.
After this
press conference, d'Escoto spoke about Gandhi and Dorothy Day, the
founder of
the Catholic Worker movement. The Catholic Workers are pacifists, they
protested the Russians as they protested the Americans. D'Escoto does
not
ascribe to this idea. It will be, if nothing else, an interesting year. Many questions should be asked.
Watch this site, and this (UN) debate.
* * *
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
Feedback: Editorial
[at] innercitypress.com
UN Office: S-453A, UN, NY 10017
USA
Tel: 212-963-1439
Reporter's mobile (and
weekends):
718-716-3540
Other,
earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available
in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright
2006-08 Inner City Press, Inc. To request
reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
innercitypress.com -
|
