UN Names N. Korea Chair of Disarmament Committee 182
LibRT writes "The irony-challenged folks at the UN have named North Korea chair of the Conference on Disarmament, which is heavily focused on the prevention of a nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament. The Canadian government has boycotted the convention, calling it an 'absurd' turn of events: 'North Korea is simply not a credible chair of a disarmament body. The fact that it gets a turn chairing a United Nations committee focused on disarmament is unacceptable, given the North Korean regime's efforts in the exact opposite direction.'"
Note that Libya was once president of the UN's Human Rights Commission, and only recently removed from its successor in interest, the Human Rights Council.
considering that Obama (Score:1, Insightful)
Who cares? (Score:4, Insightful)
The only political body in UN that has any relevance whatsoever is the Security Council, and even then only its permanent members. The rest of UN political organizations are there mostly for lulz (I don't know any other reasonable explanation for the current membership of UNHRC), and in any case, all they do is write strongly worded condemnations - mostly of Israel.
Now, UN is not entirely useless in a sense that it does have a bunch of non-political organizations that actually do useful work, like UNESCO. It's probably worth keeping it around for those, with political circus being an unfortunate attachment.
Re:Alternate Headline: North Korea is in the UN (Score:4, Insightful)
What are the chair's powers?
I'm guessing it's not much of a perk, and to snub them would be to give them reason to quit altogether.
Re:Why..? (Score:2, Insightful)
What's your alternative venue for the countries of the world to talk to each other rather than shooting at each other when there is an issue that straddles across their borders? Also, any time the US wants to opt-out and leave international politics entirely to the other countries of the world to sort out on their own, go ahead. It's a free planet, and the rest of us might be better off.
Oh, wait, but that's not what you meant. You meant you would still be able to be the global bully and/or meddler if you wanted, but with no responsibilities, accountability, or repercussions in the UN if you are?
Grow up. It's the best system we've got so far. Yes, it's flawed and imperfect. Yes, member states of the UN aren't always going to agree with your country, but that's no different from an ordinary democracy where people who disagree with each other still mostly manage to get along. Yes, the dictators and despots get their seat there too, but the assholes in a democracy also get a vote. There's a lot of general support and respect in the UN for what the United States does, and the United States has relied on the UN many times to help resolve issues of concern to it, not the least military issues. And if you think North Korea has plenty of support in the UN, that's not what the UN resolutions imply. They aren't a global pariah for no reason, and there's a long list of unanimous condemnations. This is more like "Even the crazy assholes get a voice, even though we don't have to listen to it."
I agree that this particular situation is ridiculous, which is why the rules should be changed so that hypocritical appointments like this don't happen. That's what Canada is proposing -- a change in the rules. If there are problems with the UN, then work on fixing them with the rest of us so that it is more effective. Before you say "screw the whole thing", at least realize that the world situation without the UN would probably be a lot worse.
Re:That's as silly as if... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Alternate Headline: North Korea is in the UN (Score:4, Insightful)
As long as we're not shooting them, anything we can do diplomatically to soften them up is a good thing.
Not having them as participants in the disarmament talks means they have no reason even to hear what we say about it.
Not having them in the UN means they have no choice but to continue to treat the entire world as their enemy.
Letting them have participation in democratic institutions will maybe open their eyes to their own hypocrisy, a little bit every day.
Legitimacy - and the Korean War (Score:5, Insightful)
Can someone please explain why the U.S. should host, subsidize, or be a member of the U.N. given its current condition and activities? In all seriousness, I can think of no reason whatsoever.
The U.S. tends to look down on the U.N., as do most truly powerful countries. But the U.S. also is incredibly undereducated about the U.N. compared to many other nations, in part because we look down on the U.N. and our media provides information so slowly that snails eclipsed their information store long ago, and in part because as a powerful country with our own independent foreign agenda, we frankly tend to have more news that's related to what we are doing than we do about what the U.N. is doing.
But the U.N. is still important--it provides support for some important humanitarian work, for one (UNICEF and UNODC come to mind). It provides an international mechanism for justice and oversight of elections and regime change when countries are ready for those things. (The International Criminal Tribunals and later the International Criminal Court, for example.) It also determines whether wars are legal or illegal under International law, and arbitrates certain small disputes under international law. The legality of a war will influence the legitimacy of that war in the eyes of the world.
The Security Council was effectively neutered for the cold war by the perpetual split between Russia and and the U.S. China had no rep for a while in the 50s, and because of that the U.S. got approval for the Korean War (i.e. the UN action against North Korea). China learned its lesson and started sending representatives to the security council again. The U.S., similarly, as one of the only world powers with a veto over security council resolutions--a power that would NEVER be given to the US in a new, similar international body today--has a great interest in maintaining its presence in the United Nations.
In addition, the level of isolationism in the US is frankly frightening. It's nothing like North Korea, of course, but there are a LOT of Americans who are incredibly insular. It isn't as bad as some of the numbers suggest--the very few Americans having a passport is more a testimony to the fact that you have to go farther to cross a border than you do in Europe--but it's bad. Most people in the US know effectively nothing about modern international affairs, and only a small percentage know anything about international history. During the presidential election, for example, then-candidate Obama expressing his willingness to go into Pakistan if necessary was a relatively small bit of trivia here, and most people had no freaking clue how upset his statements to that effect made pretty much everyone in Pakistan. Fast-forward a few years, and you see the consequences of that ignorance--the public's response to Pakistan's being upset with the actual raid isn't "We know how big a deal this was for you, we felt we had to do it, and we'll make it up to you," it was "if you're upset it must be because you were hiding Osama!"
We need more international involvement, not less. Better education. Why the hell we don't have every schoolchild in America watching good conferences on major international issues via the web and answering quizzes on them I have no idea. Not every day--but do four conferences a year on different subjects, and they'd learn a hell of a lot.
Problems Specifically WRT International Justice... (Score:5, Insightful)
The international criminal court and international criminal tribunals have a pretty big problem in the fact that neither of them are recognized by the the world's current lone superpower.
The US does not recognize either of these bodies. That is a pretty fundamental problem for a supposedly international organization.
Good Choice (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think anyone gets why North Korea is actually an ideal choice for the UN Disarmament chair. Check out the website [un.org] and you'll get a clue. Sure, there's lip-service from the council on WMDs and nuclear weapons, but the major effort right now is toward disarming the civilians of every country. And in that regard, North Korea is an excellent example of how thoroughly it can be done, and a perfect choice to lead the effort in teaching other countries to do the same.
Despite Eric Holder's efforts with ATF's "Gunrunner" and "Fast and Furious" programs seemed to have backfired, and the disarmament media effort in North America will be significantly curtailed due to the inept handling of that false flag effort. A country like North Korea - probably the world leader in successful disarmament of its citizens, is the perfect choice for restarting the international effort, and assisting the United States in making better progress in that regard.
Re:Alternate Headline: North Korea is in the UN (Score:4, Insightful)
"But they only destroyed two Japanese cities with them!"
You'll notice Japan has not invaded the following countries since then: Burma, China, Indochina, the Philippines, Malaysia, Manchuria, Hong Kong, Singapore, and the US (think Aleutians).