--- One of these days it would be nice if a resolution actually resolved something.
GENEVA, April 23 -- The U.N. Commission on Human Rights
overwhelmingly adopted a resolution Friday expressing concern about the
scale of reported abuses in Sudan's Darfur region and agreed to appoint
its own investigator.
whoop-de-freaking-doo.
Let's be logical about this just for one moment. 1. The legally
recognized Sudanese government is on the killing. Why would Bashir want
anyone to come and monitor for human rights abuses when he's the one
committing them? 2. Sudan is a bitch to enter, exit or traverse. Bashir
wants it that way. a. there's a snowball's chance in hell of Bashir
actually granting a UN official an entry visa into Sudan b. if an entry
visa does happen to be granted, well, don't expect to leave Khartoum.
c. Darfur is hell and gone from Khartoum, and just from a quick peek at
the Michelin map of Sudan that I have hanging on my wall, there are
only four main roads that lead into Darfur. And that's it. Roads, I
might mention, that are strictly in government held territory, where
the army roams around with actual goddamn Kalashnikovs, just hoping to
shoot someone, you know, since there's not as much action in the South
anymore. Are you actually trying to tell me that you wouldn't soil your
UN blue undies, Mr. Inspector, if by some strange twist of fate you
actually did manage to make it to Darfur? 3. This whole exercise in
logic is moot because Bashir doesn't want you talking to people who
might say unflattering things about him and his army. And no one will
say anything unflattering about him and his army because, if they had a
choice about it, they'd prefer to live, thank you ever so much.
The UN and the UNHCR: a modern comedy of errors. Unfortunately, their
blindness to the impracticalities of their ways mean people die. It's
not very funny, is it? I do wonder though. How many people have had to
die or were maimed, raped, tortured and abused simply because the UN
passed a resolution and didn't do anything to actually resolve the
issue? Do you think that for all the statisticians they employ at the
UN, the WHO, the UNHCR, UNICEF and the like, that someone has actually
tallied it up?