UNITED
NATIONS,
December 20 --
Amid the
violence in
South Sudan,
with the UN
evacuating its
peacekeepers
from Yuai and
11 hours
slower than
India
to report on
deaths in
Akobo, the
United States'
messaging is
strange.
From
Washington
Susan Rice,
now National
Security Adviser,
recorded a
five
minute speech
to the people
of South Sudan,
posted here
by Grant T.
Harris. Rice
is closely
associated
with the
country's
independence;
in October
2010 Inner
City Press
witnessed her
giving a pep
talk to young
recruits a
short UN
helicopter
ride from
Juba in Rejaf
/ Rajaf, click
here
for that
story.
Her
speech, though
long, doesn't
mention the
performance of
the UN.
Should
it be pulling
armed
peacekeepers
out of areas
where
civilians
are under
threat, like
in Yuai? Why
wasn't the UN
able or
willing to
contact Riek
Machar in the
day or days
after the
violence
began?
Rice's
successor as
US Ambassador
to the UN
Samantha
Power,
meanwhile, as
been in the
Central
African
Republic and
Chad, from
which she tweeted
Friday
night she had
raised the
issue of the
recruitment of
child
soldiers,
for which Chad
is on the UN
list even as
UN
Peacekeeping's
Herve Ladsous
accept this
former French
colony into
the UN mission
in
Mali, MINUSMA.
Once
there, the
Chadian troops
are charged
with gang
rape. Did
Ambassador
Power raise
that, as she
raised the
Congolese
Army's rapes
in Minovo
to Joseph
Kabila during
the UN
Security
Council's trip
there?
Chad
is part of the
peacekeeping
mission in the
Central
African
Republic,
even as they
are viewed as
supporters of
the Seleka
rebels. What
Power say
about that?
The
UN, since a
Friday noon
briefing full
on
contradictions
has gone
silence other
than a
statement
ostensibly
from Ban
Ki-moon, who
is in
the
Philippines.
The UN
says it will
have no
briefings at
all next
week,
despite
developments
in South
Sudan. Will
the US have
more to
say? Watch
this site.
, 
