No, I’m not kidding. And remember: the US taxpayer is footing around 20% of the bill for this kind of bullsh!t.
Tell me again why the US doesn’t give that clown carnival the heave-ho?
Category: United Nations
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20 missiles found hidden in UN School in Gaza
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency is apologizing to Israel when they discovered 20 missiles which had been stored in their school in Gaza during a regular inspection of their facility which they claim was empty at the time, according to the Times of Israel
“UNRWA strongly condemns the group or groups responsible for placing the weapons in one of its installations. This is a flagrant violation of the inviolability of its premises under international law,” the statement read.
The discovery would seem to confirm Israel’s oft-repeated claim that Hamas and other Gazan terror groups use civilian infrastructure to hide weapons.
From ABC News;
It said that they “informed the relevant parties and successfully took all necessary measures for the removal of the objects in order to preserve the safety and security of the school.”
The agency didn’t identify the location of the school, the types of rockets or who the “relevant parties” were.
I’m not sure how it’s possible to sneak 20 missiles into a school, but at least someone at the UN seems to be doing their job.
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UN: Iran exports weapons
Something odd is happening at the UN. The other day, a UN official called for the use of force in Iraq to turn back the ISIS juggernaut. Today we read from Reuters that UN experts admitted that Iran is exporting weapons to other conflicts violating UN sanctions against the mullahs in Tehran.
The finding comes just days ahead of the next round of negotiations in Vienna between Iran and six world powers aimed at securing a deal that would gradually lift international sanctions on Tehran — including the arms embargo — in exchange for curbs on the controversial Iranian nuclear program.
Despite Israel’s public statements that the seized arms were destined for Gaza — an allegation that Gaza’s governing Islamist militant group Hamas dismissed as a fabrication — the experts said the weapons were being sent to Sudan.
The experts do not speculate in the report about why the arms were being sent to Sudan, a country which Western diplomatic and intelligence sources have told Reuters has in the past been a conduit for Iranian arms shipments to other locations in Africa, as well as the Gaza Strip.
I guess the UN is tired of being on the wrong side of history. Either that or they know that no matter what they discover or announce, no one on the planet is going to act on their findings these days.
The U.N. experts reached their conclusion after investigating the case and inspecting the seized cargo and documentation related to the shipment, which traveled from the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas to the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr, and from there in the direction of Port Sudan.
The vessel was intercepted by the Israeli navy in the Red Sea before it reached Sudan.
“The Panel finds that the manner of concealment in this case is consistent with several other cases reported to the (Security Council’s Iran Sanctions) Committee and investigated by the Panel,” the experts said.
In related news, headlines blast out that “Israel strikes at Gaza militant sites” hardly mentioning that 30 rockets have struck Israel in the last two weeks from Gaza. I mention this because Israel claimed that the Iranian weapons stored aboard the Iranian ship were headed for Gaza, while the UN rejects that notion.
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France threatens “force” in Syria
Yeah, I know, I haven’t stopped laughing and it’s hard to type with tears running down my face, but France finally found something to get outraged about in the Middle East – namely Syria’s supposed use of chemical weapons yesterday. From CNN;
Hours after the closed-door meeting, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told CNN affiliate BFMTV that “a reaction of force must be taken” if the allegations are true.
“If the U.N. Security Council cannot do it, decisions will be made otherwise,” Fabius said. But, he said, sending ground troops to Syria is out of question.
I’m sure that Fabius is not threatening the use of French troops or armament – mostly likely some form of having someone else do something. Apparently, Russia and China have blocked the Security Council from doing anything which forces the UN to recognize it’s absolute uselessness in world affairs.
Yuval Steinitz, Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs, told Israel Radio Thursday morning that its intelligence assessments indicated that “chemical weapons were used, and they were not used for the first time.”
He accused the international community of “paying lip service” when it comes to Syria.
“Nothing practical, significant, has been done in the last two years in order to stop the continuing massacre of civilians carried out by the Assad regime,” he said. “I think that the investigation of the United Nations is a joke.”
Not to mention their inability to stop Iran from building a nuclear arsenal.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu called on the United Nations to act decisively, Turkey’s semi-official Anadolu news agency reported.
Davutoglu said “all red lines” have been crossed without the United Nations taking action in Syria and that the body “can’t assume an undecisive attitude about chemical weapon attacks” there.
Well, you guys made the UN a bloated bureaucracy that can’t get out of it’s own way, so live with it or dismantle it.
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UN Peacekeepers ambushed in Darfur; 7 killed
The Washington Times reports that 7 UN Peacekeepers were killed in an ambush in Sudan’s Darfur region yesterday;
The assault included sustained heavy fire from machine guns and possibly rocket-propelled grenades, targeting the force some 25 kilometers (15 miles) west of the town of Khor Abeche, U.N. forces spokesman Chris Cycmanick said. Reinforcements later arrived to rescue the wounded, which included two female police advisers, the force said in a statement.
But, don’t worry, the UN is on-the-job, writing their strongly worded protest;
“The mission condemns in the strongest possible terms those responsible for this heinous attack on our peacekeepers,” said Mohamed Ibn Chambas, a joint special representative of the force. “The perpetrators should be on notice that they will be pursued for this crime and gross violation of international humanitarian law.”
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That UN gun treaty thing
I don’t trust either side in this discussion, unfortunately, there is virtually no source material on the treaty that passed the United Nations General Assembly today. Apparently, we’re supposed to just trust our UN politicians that they would only act in our best interests. All I can find at this point is news reports and press releases. I know that the NRA tells us that it’s bad, but then, so do China, India, Russia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Iran. According to the Washington Post, folks I mistrust on the other side who like it aren’t much more trustworthy;
U.S. officials and several nongovernmental organizations, including the American Bar Association, have argued that the treaty would have no impact on American gun rights.
Its specific language recognizes the “legitimate trade and lawful ownership, and use of certain conventional arms for recreational, cultural, historical and sporting activities.”
On Tuesday, Secretary of State John F. Kerry welcomed the approval of the treaty, describing it as a “strong, effective and implementable” tool that can “strengthen global security while protecting the sovereign right of states to conduct legitimate arms trade.”
Oh, yeah, Amnesty International likes it, too. So, given the folks who like the treaty (whom I’m sure haven’t read it either) don’t inspire confidence.
The UN’s website says;
According to the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs, the treaty will not do any of the following: interfere with domestic arms commerce or the right to bear arms in Member States; ban the export of any type of weapon; harm States’ legitimate right to self-defence; or undermine national arms regulation standards already in place.
But the Washington Post says;
The treaty would require governments to establish a national record-keeping system to track the trade in conventional arms. They would also have to ensure that weapons are not illegally diverted to terrorist organizations or other armed groups. In addition, governments would conduct risk assessments to determine the likelihood that arms exports were being used to abuse human rights, particularly against women or children.
Either way, I’m pretty sure that we won’t be able to supply aid to any of our allies like Israel. The UN has sanctioned Israel more than 130 times since 1967. I’m pretty sure the UN would find a way to disarm them. Meanwhile, just like gun control inside the US, the treaty would be useless against criminal states like Syria and Iran, and those other countries I listed who abstained from voting or voted against the treaty. The only countries that would adhere to the mysterious treaty are the ones that always do – the US, the UK, Canada, etc….
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Muslim nations seek ban on insults in UN
The Washington Times reports on a movement in the United Nations which seeks to ban insults and muzzle freedom of speech in member nations;
Turkey heads the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, a body of 57 nations, which has long pushed for a U.N. resolution condemning the “defamation of religion.”
Nonbinding versions of the resolution have been adopted, but the effort was crushed last year by religious groups and human rights activists who argued that it represented a dangerous step toward an international law against free speech.
The debate has been reignited by “Innocence of Muslims,” a crudely produced film made in the United States that has sparked fury in the Muslim world. Protesters have breached the walls at U.S. embassies and desecrated American flags in sometimes violent demonstrations. A protest in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi ended with the deaths of the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.
The article continues that Hillary Clinton has appealed to Muslims to show “dignity” in dealing with the film. I’m sure the word “dignity” needed to be explained to more than a few people who had just heard the word for the very first time.
I guess no one noticed that a law against insults would pretty much prevent Iran president Amahdinejad or Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez from speaking at the UN ever again, or from speaking in public ever again, actually.
“We call for legislation or a resolution to criminalize contempt of Islam as a religion and its prophet,” Emad Abdel Ghaffour, who heads the [Egyptian] ultra-orthodox sect’s Nour political party, told Reuters over the weekend.
Yeah, the UN can’t control the proliferation of nuclear arms to terrorist nations, but they’re supposed to control public speech.