United Nations Supports Mugabe May 13, 2007
Posted by Fleeced in Assholes, Economics, Politics.trackback
Unbelievably, Zimbabwe was recently elected as head of the UN’s Commision on Sustainable Development, the “main UN inter-governmental body on the environment.”
Despite objections from Western nations, the 53-nation commission voted Zimbabwe’s environment and tourism minister, Francis Nheme, as chairman to replace oil-producer Qatar.
The post rotates among regions and Africa nominated Mr Nheme as chairman of the commission.
Both the US and the EU have imposed targeted sanctions against Zimbabwe for human rights abuses.
This is such an incredible display of insanity and moral bankruptcy on part of the UN that I’m left wondering why people ever take them seriously. As the Australian prime minister put it:
“President Mugabe has trashed Zimbabwean democracy, enriched himself and his cronies, subverted the rule of law and presided over the systematic and brutal oppression of that country’s civil society and political opposition.”
With an inflation rate of over 1000%, crumbling infrastructure, and plummeting life expectancy, they’re the perfect choice for heading a commision on sustainable development, aren’t they? After all, with all that decreased production, they’d just have to be emitting less green house gasses!
| You can look at the progress of Zimbabwe with regards to health and economic prosperity for yourself by clicking the image to the right (warning: takes a little while to load, and requires Flash). When it loads, click on Zimbabwe, and press Play – you’ll literally see Mugabe’s trail of destruction right there on the graph – with both wealth and life expectancy taking a nose-dive. |  |
It’s important that the world takes a stand against such regimes, but if we are to see any improvement, then it’s vital for the region to take some responsibility. If they continue not to do so, Africa will remain as the world’s economic and social basket case.
[Via Andrew Bolt]
UPDATE: Zimbabwe slams ‘racist’ Australia
After banning our cricket team from touring Zimbabwe later this year, Zimbabwe has demonstrated a classic case of double-think:
“By putting political pressure on their national cricket team not to come to Zimbabwe, the Australian prime minister is flouting United Nations principles on human rights because sporting is a human right which must be respected,” Mr Ndlovu told Zimbabwe newspaper The Herald.
Ah, so we’re violating human rights. Of course! And now, they’ve played the race card:
“This is also a racist ploy to kill our local cricket since our cricket team is now dominated by black players as we slowly transform cricket from being an elite sport.
I completely agree. The UN and the commission for sustainable development lose a lot of credibility by showing any support for Mugabe and the current regime in Zimbabwe. I guess the demolition of thousands of homes of “opposition” is pretty sustainable development, eh?
It’s quite incredible… found this update at Tim Blair’s blog:
On Insiders this morning (Sunday), referring to the Zimbabwe appointment to the UN, [ABC host Barrie] Cassidy asked Howard, “What does that say about Mugabe?”
Howard’s instant response: “You should be asking what does that say about the UN.”
Hate to sound cold hearted, but this is why I feel that foreign aid should stop. Usually it ends up in the hands of the corrupt and the powerful of those countries. I remember in Somalia in the 1990’s, the western nations would heap all kinds of food and money to that place, but then the warlords would come by and snatch it all up. I have even heard arguments that foreign aid actually keeps dictators in power longer.
fleeced
that’s a powerful tool.
i wonder why south africa and botswana show equally precipitous falls in life expectancy.
mad dog: I don’t think it’s heartless – actually, it’s a good observation.
I had a blog entry last year talking about how I had donated to the appeal for 2004 Boxing Day tsunami… and was horrified to learn that some of the money may have been diverted to islamists implementing sharia law in Aceh:
http://fleeced.wordpress.com/2006/12/21/good-deeds/
Michelle Malkin had a video piece about it as well:
http://hotair.com/archives/2006/12/19/disastrous-disaster-aid/
[...] new bloggy discovery fleeced has a superb graphical representation (requires flash) of Zimbabwe’s plummeting life expectancy and wealth, and spiralling [...]