Lost Opportunities at the UN

09/21/2006

Paul Munnis

As I see it, yesterday Mr. Chavez, and the President of Iran, used the UN as a political theater of the absurd to call attention to their plights.

What are their complaints anyhow?

In the case of Iran they want the right to develop atomic energy and they have been offered fully paid for, turn-key, atomic energy plants by the EU and the U.S. Yet they have rejected these offers instead wanting to build plants capable of creating atomic bomb stockpiles. The world is not going to permit that no matter how cute the speeches made or how much they are wrapped in anti-American hate and rhetoric. The real audience was the young people of Iran whom the present regime wants to convert to supporting their anti-Israeli and anti-American extreme views.

In the case of Mr. Chavez, the man simply seems daft. He has wanted and he has sought an opportunity for world-wide anti-American and anti-Bush theater and he got it yesterday having a wonderful time for himself on the podium of the UN wherein he acted out his message. He is getting short-term political applause at home but he has placed Venezuela in a bad diplomatic position for the future.

What are the messages from Mr. Chavez? Chief among them is that the lesser countries, some with nut-cases running them, do not have Security Council veto power. Yet instead of showing this as international danger he managed to show that the UN formula is in fact a good policy, one that prevents propagandists and rabble-rousers like himself from taking over the UN.

Some might say: “well look at President Bush, he used the UN to attack Iraq.” In fact that is false and it illustrates how well the UN really does work. The UN told Bush to blow it out his spout and that they would not support any assault on Iraq and then Mr. Bush took the matter into his own hands and invaded Iraq without UN approval. On more than one occasion the UN Secretary General has reminded the world that the U.S. is in Iraq on an illegal aggression basis and is illegally occupying Iraq and that this must to be adjudicated and atoned for in due time. Right now the UN is trying to find a way to nation-build Iraq as their first priority.

This explains why Mr. Bush stands accused by the UN of international aggression violations and why he could go on trial by the UN once his term of office ends. The U.S. acted as vigilante where Iraq is concerned and a lot of people have died as a direct result, far more than was killed by Saddam. Justice must ultimately prevail in this case because we cannot have the Bush actions sanctioned as proper behavior for a major power. 

Then there are the UN Human Rights Commission charges against Mr. Bush. Those could get him hung. Really! That is no overstatement, although the current sentiment in the UN is to instead place violators into prison for life. Just ask Mr. Millosovich who is on trial right now by the UN for his role in ethnic cleansing human rights violations in the former Yugoslavia. He will likely draw a death sentence and then it will be commuted to “Life in Prison.” That could happen to Mr. Bush too. It should be happening to Saddam Hussein except that Bush used Iraq to put him on trial instead of using the UN world court to get the job done. Bush wants Saddam dead and he likely wouldn’t get that from the UN. Remember the U.S. now has 35,000 detainees in U.S. prisons and this discussion of torture and abuse is not an academic debate at Yale. Real lives are hanging in the balance.

This also partly explains why Mr. Bush wants the U.S. laws of Executive Privilege changed so that he can avoid many of the international human rights violation charges that would cause him to be tried by the UN in international courts of law once he leaves office. Not only Mr. Bush but much of his Cabinet is at legal risk. Bush seeks to be given Executive Power by the U.S. government retroactively as if he were entitled to do these things without a formal ‘Act of War’ from the Congress (he has no such Act).

In other words the U.S. has committed an illegal aggression against Iraq and also Mr. Bush has tortured and abused POW’s in violation of international laws. What Mr. Bush is proposing to fix it is so flawed that his own Party is taking him to task and he is busy trying to negotiate some sort of deal for himself. Democrats are wisely sitting out the political debate until they see what the real deal is from the GOP.

So there are many things that Mr. Chavez and the President of Iran could have said at the UN that were more thoughtful and far more cogent charges against Mr. Bush but they missed their real opportunity to score points as they instead chose to use the UN podium for anti-American and anti-Bush political rhetoric that score points at home politically but is nonsense on the world stage. Their beef is with Mr. Bush but their words were directed against the U.S. who is not culpable as a nation. As things stand right now Mr. Bush is in pretty big legal trouble and they should have pushed this point.

Many people might agree with Mr. Chavez that Mr. Bush is a devil in disguise but he missed his opportunity to state the real facts, instead choosing a more dramatic and theatrical and absurd political presentation. Mr. Chavez would have been better off sending a speechmaker who is a prosecuting attorney and knowledgeable of international law to represent his nation and their position.

After this theatrical day at the UN the world will stretch, yawn, and carry-on. Neither actor had any real audience impact. Neither can cause real change with that sort of behavior. Mr. Bush will carry on his illegal occupation of Iraq and the GOP may or may not support him in this matter. For both Iran and for Venezuela it was a lost opportunity to seek real change and to inspire real justice. As for Iran, the UN Security Council today takes up the matter of international sanctions against them. The youth of Iran and the people of Venezuela will be the real victims of their government’s stupidity.