Broken Masterpieces

December 26, 2003

Iraqi Minister Slams Kofi

I was just doing a search of my entries and found I'd not published it. I wrote it about 10 days ago and now the article I reference is archived. Oh well.

This article talks about how Iraq's foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, slammed the UN for how they are handling post-Saddam Iraq.

Here's some nuggets:

"Settling scores with the United States-led coalition should not be at the cost of helping to bring stability to the Iraqi people," Mr. Zebari said in language unusually scolding for an occupant of the guest seat at the end of the curving Security Council table.

"Squabbling over political differences takes a back seat to the daily struggle for security, jobs, basic freedoms and all the rights the U.N. is chartered to uphold," he said.

"One year ago, the Security Council was divided between those who wanted to appease Saddam Hussein and those who wanted to hold him accountable.

"The United Nations as an organization failed to help rescue the Iraqi people from a murderous tyranny that lasted over 35 years, and today we are unearthing thousands of victims in horrifying testament to that failure."

Kofi Annan responds with:

"Now is not the time to pin blame and point fingers," he told reporters. Saying that Mr. Zebari was "obviously entitled to his opinion," Mr. Annan said that the United Nations had done as much for Iraq as it could under the circumstances and was prepared to do more.

"Quite honestly," he said, "now is not the time to hurl accusations and counter-accusations."

Bottom line, I really like the straight talking Mr. Zebari. Now, this UN that has let down Iraq time and time again (and continues to do so) is the organization that many Democrats want to turn Iraq over to? The UN must first prove itself. Maybe if the Iraqi council would be loudly anti-Israel then the UN would help them.

Posted by Tim at December 26, 2003 11:18 PM
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