This would be the first mildly promising action taken in Darfur, since the UN entered the picture months ago except it isn’t going to happen until the end of the year - if it actually happens. In the mean time, the systematic exploitation, rape, and genocide in the Sudan will go unchecked for many more months.
A Thai battalion assigned to the United Nations peace-keeping force in Darfur could be deployed at the end of the year, the director of the Supreme Command Headquarters peace operations centre said yesterday.
The 800 troops would be part of a 14-nation peace-keeping operation in the war-torn region of western Sudan under the UN-African Union joint mission, Maj-Gen Jerdwut Kraprayoon said.
The deployment was initially scheduled for the end of last year, but was postponed because the UN and the Sudanese were unable to agree on many points. Training was complete and the troops were ready for the peace-keeping operation, he said.
To date, only Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Nigeria are commissioned to join the Darfur peace-keeping mission, known as Unamid.
They should call it Unashrug or Unawhatever for all of the effort going into this operation.
When are we going to learn that this model does not work? The very important endeavor to feed people and provide medical assistance to displaced persons is a great undertaking and well worth any risk for the benefit it can provide desperate people. Yet, for the vastness of its resources and the access the UN has to military assistance, it is incapable of doing anything beyond relief work in these scenarios. The model being used today is like trying to treat a .45 gunshot wound with a bandaid.
Renewed fighting in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC) North Kivu province today has forced the United Nations refugee agency to halt the distribution of aid to internally displaced persons and to call off a drive to register newly displaced people in the Rutshuru area.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) suspended operations after reports of new fighting between Government soldiers and fighters from the rebel Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) near the Kinyandoni Anglican IDP site in North Kivu. Clashes on Saturday and Sunday left at least one woman dead.
There needs to be a great deal of reform in the UN itself, so that people can actually look at these issues holistically and come to some better solution from the international community.
The United Nations - a study in how to call Iran’s sister and request silly things (Monty Python).
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called Monday for immediate presidential elections in Lebanon without foreign interference and told Syria and Iran they must support the disarmament of Hezbollah’s well-armed militia.
How odd - what exactly is the message here? Does anyone take United Nations sound-bite declarations seriously?
