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The UNITED NATIONS: The case against a Defunct International Humanitarian Organization.

By Devinda Fernando (3/25/2008)

I admire Dr. Dayan Jayatillika very much for he is a very patient and tolerant individual. He has the strength to endure these long pointless meetings held by the Louise Arbors of this world, spending weeks and months chit chatting about a microcosm of a 25 year old conflict in our country. This week is the UN's Panel Discussion, Sri Lanka: The case against an International Monitoring Mission. The topic of conversation is nothing more than a time wasting exercise to discuss what we already know but can't prove….LTTE agents are being done away with by their rivals.

Big Whoop!? So what if a few LTTE financiers fall prey to abductions and kidnappings… Let me be the bad guy and come out and say what is on everyone's lips: One Less LTTE supporter is one step in the right direction towards an end to this conflict. No one cared when the shoe was on the other foot and the LTTE were performing the abductions and killings of their rivals. We're not even talking about a huge number of people,… last report I read was around a hundred or so people this year? Someone please correct me if I'm wrong. What is to be gained by this meeting? Do the UN stooges who want a Permanent setup in Sri Lanka really care about a couple hundred people with nefarious underworld connections gone missing? It seems like this is just another opportunity to expand an already obese Bureaucratic organization and justify a higher budget for future years. So we have to have one of our top men like Dr. J. waste his precious time playing host to these self-fellating, self-anointed, Human Rights champions. I on the other hand would be breaking chairs over the heads of these UN clowns who waste so much of our time and money debating a topic that veils a hidden agenda.

What is the purpose of the UN anyway? Seems like it is just another quasi, multi-jurisdictional organization run by opportunists who could not gain meaningful employment in the private sector. Carving up countries in the name of Human Rights. The UN has gotten so fat and bloated since its inception that it is creating jobs for so many of these Lower-Middle-Class-Nobodies of Western countries to enable themselves to traject into their former colonial lands once again with and air of arrogance and self-importance.

"We're Here to Help you Little Brown People" seems to be the vibe we get from them as they discuss the faults of our country in the fashion of a School grade report card.

After stealing the wealth of Asia during their Imperialism and Colonialism, setting up the rules of commerce in their favor once the advantage was gained militarily; they now return to point the finger in an almost mocking way as to how 'underdeveloped' we still are... After displaying savagery to the likes that Mankind has never before witnessed, they now claim themselves "Civilized" and "Advanced", able to care about the less fortunate backward nations like Sri Lanka.

The UN is a pointless organization, filled to the brim with useless, worthless, bleeding heart, western jokers who have struck the dream job jackpot of being able to 'seem important', get paid six figure salaries while vacationing in tropical paradises, with six weeks paid vacation, and weekend excursions to beach resorts even during a time of war. Learn to Scuba dive, water ski or sun bathe, human rights is their business, but not when they are partying with the other white people in Galle, Bentota, and Unawatuna. What could be more rewarding for westerners than to live a life of one long vacation, socializing with other white folks, and doing things they can brag to their friends back home about? Living in Sri Lanka while getting paid wages comparable to their own countries ensures that they live in Sri Lanka without actually having to endure 'Life' in Sri Lanka.

Most of these UN people ride around in white, sound-proof, climate-controlled Pajero Jeeps with GPS locators, SAT Phones, and Laptop uplinks. They don't even have to drive themselves…. The more fortunate of our very own 'little brown people' do that for them. They all tout equality, and claim that they are here to promote it, yet if they truly had to live as equals with the "little brown people" they come here to help they would be on the next plane home within 2 weeks. Promoting equality as a business and a career is only an attractive endeavor if one doesn't actually have to practice what they preach.

What's worse is that UN and the fine people who work for it float lofty ideals from their pulpits like the "Elimination of Poverty" and "No More War" yet fail to realize that these things are first and foremost a result of their own countries thirst for power, and secondly ideals that cannot be achieved. They put together manuals of step-by-step instructions on how to handle crisis situations as if there is some Cookie-Cutter, Text Book approach to handling the humanitarian aspects of all wars and conflicts??? It scares me that they have Masters and PhD educated employees who speak in terms of ideals when dealing with very real, very unique and nuanced situations of human conflict. If these people want to genuinely help a country they need to listen and learn the politics of that country and that situation, not Preach it.

The real issue that no one talks about is the fact that the UN is being used as a way to further political interests.... Plain and simple. The UN is not impartial across the board. Whenever countries like the USA, Russia, China, Great Britain and France don't like anything that the UN has to say about their foreign policy decisions, they simply Veto the UN. They have that ability as they are the Five Permanent Member Nations who are the founders and thus hold more power in the UN than any other country. This is their club and we other countries are simply 'guests' invited to enter. They can behave any which way they like as it is their house, the rest of us have to be on our best behavior or else we get shown to the door. So instead of these 5 permanent member nations upholding the principles of the UN, they use the UN to further their political, economical, and security interests in the world.

Surprise, Surprise! Nations acting in their own interests??? No! Who would ever do such a thing like that? Surely countries like Britain and the USA would act responsibly and impartially when it comes to wielding Great Power? Cough, cough, Iraq…. What's next? The USA seems obsessed with preventing Iran from obtaining Nuclear capabilities, and are willing to use their own Nukes to prevent that from happening…! Can anyone see the irony? America claims that Iran is not responsible enough to possess Nukes as a country yet yields her own Nuclear arsenal like a child who just found his dad's gun. One would have thought the lesson learned from the now defunct League of Nations after World War One was that selfish behavior on the part of the victors of War would only lead to future conflict….one would have thought that if one really cared ….

That being said, Sri Lanka is a target of other countries and non-state actors. Just as major super powers like the USA use and manipulate the UN, so to do the likes of the LTTE and Tamil Nationalist factions living abroad who see the big boys blatantly manipulate the rules in broad daylight and thus emboldened quickly follow in their footsteps. The UN panel is not about Human Rights, it never has been. People disappearing or dying in such small numbers is not something the UN should be focusing on. With Six Billion of we 'Insects' roaming this planet, and tens of thousands dying each day the disappearances of approximately a hundred or so people this year in a War zone is a relative non-event.

If the UN wants to achieve something significant in the preservation of Human Rights and Life they should focus their energy and resources in critical areas like Sudan, Darfur,…or dare I say Iraq or Afghanistan? Ahhh, but we all know how hard it is for the UN to intervene in a situation caused by one of its Permanent members…. Those hundreds of thousands killed there are not open to UN scrutiny and we all know why. And besides what UN workers want to go to a place like Iraq or Afghanistan? Even though they would get to travel in the same climate-controlled vehicles and carry cool powder blue passports with the UN logo, they don't get to live the comparable 'Colombo 7' existence and vacation on the weekends in the South by the beach cavorting with other white people smoking, drinking, fornicating, and forgetting why they are there in the first place.

If it were up me there would be no Panel Discussion… no talk,… the official response of our Government to any UN delegate should be "PLEASE SHUT THE F**K UP YOU STUPID MUPPET" each and every time… Blunt? maybe, Harsh? perhaps a little….To the Point?… I think so! But hey, that's just me.

Like I said,…I admire Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka very much, for he is a very patient and tolerant individual…


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