December 2010
76 posts
Bamiyan in fall →
There are many places like this in Afghanistan to be seen. It reminds me the fall of 2007 in which i spent the the entire day wandering around and just taking picture of everything. I…
Choking Feeling →
It was last year at this time of the year; I was torn apart with the grief and sorrow at my mom’s death. I was at school when I noticed that she left the world. That night, I was left in shock and…
Somalia: How do you solve a problem like Somalia? →
Afghanistan: UN Secretary General outlines... →
Iraq’s Invisible Refugees →
Ankawa, a neighborhood on the north side of Erbil, in northern Iraq, does not live and breathe like a refugee camp or place of suffering. It is a cluster of streets dotted with Chaldean churches,…
Furnace in Herat →
It’s an old system of furnace which is still in use in cities and in outlying areas. It has a simple setup, a wheel attached to a blower machine and the blower’s end hooked into the…
The difficult year ahead at Turtle Bay →
The
year 2010 got off to an awful beginning for the United Nations, with the
breakdown in climate talks at Copenhagen shaking confidence in multilateral
diplomacy, and a devastating…
China, Congo and Japan: Soccer politics →
George Clooney, the UN, and Eyes in the Sky Over... →
This is very cool ideal.
The Satellite Sentinel Project — initiated by George Clooney — combines satellite imagery analysis and field reports with Google’s Map Maker technology to deter the…
Turkish Woman in Berlin →
Today, it’s said that there are around 4 million people living in Germany who have family roots in Turkey. Relations with Germans have been beset with problems. Hostile attacks on the…
Should ECOWAS Invade Cote D’Ivoire? →
Leaders from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) arrived in Abudja, Cote D’Ivoire today to issue Laurent Gbagbo an ultimatum: Step aside or be forced out. The implied threat…
Massive recruitment, WikiLeaks and elections →
A quick news roundup before I go offline for a few days. Guy de Boeck has an article on CongoForum asking some questions about preparations for the elections - among other things, he points out…
Africa takes the lead in resolving Ivory Coast's... →
As Ivory
Coast faced an electoral crisis with two presidential candidates declaring
victory after a November 28 runoff election, African leaders decided to take
the lead in preventing a…
Russian initiative to stop South Korean military... →
A Russian effort at the U.N. to pressure South Korea to halt plans
to launch military exercises in the coming days collapsed yesterday
after the 15 nation-council failed to reach agreement on a…
Russia presses for UN role in mediating crisis in... →
The Russian government called today for an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council to try to ease a standoff between North Korea and South Korea, and launched an initiative to enlist U.N….
Greece: A Harsh Welcome to Europe →
This is a pretty amazing mini-documentary from the UN refugee Agency about the experiences of a Darfuri migrant in Greece.
Ban Ki-Moon, Steven Colbert, and Arnold... →
Hollywood has
its Oscars, and Washington has its White House Correspondent’s Association dinner, while we here at the U.N. have the U.N. Correspondents Association Awards’
Ball, a quirky…
D.R. of Congo: Conflict minerals guidelines and... →
Congo club on the brink of world fame →
Tomorrow is a hugely momentous day for the Congo. TP Mazembe, a soccer team from Lubumbashi, will face off with Inter Milan in Abu Dhabi for the title of best soccer club in the world. It is hard to…
Somalia, Aid Agencies United Despite Rumored... →
When several aid workers didn’t show up to an aid coordination meeting this week in Somalia, a Deputy Minister told reporters their agencies and their aid to thousands at a critical time would be…
@UN votes to name alleged rapists in war →
UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously Thursday to name and shame individuals and parties to armed conflict that are “credibly suspected” of committing rape or other forms of sexual violence.
The council said it intends to use the list, to be compiled by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, “for more focused United Nations engagement with those...
Sudan Briefing at the Security Council; Indigenous... →
Global Strategy on Women’s and Children’s Health: today the WHO announced that it is establishing a high-level commission to develop an accountability framework for the resources committed to…
The people of Northern DR Congo are not looking... →
For two years running Christmas has been a time of fear and terror for the people of north east Congo.
On Christmas Eve 2008 and over the following three weeks, 865 women, men and children were savagely beaten to death and hundreds more abducted by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in north-eastern DRC and southern Sudan.
Last Christmas, between 14 and 17 December 2009, LRA commanders...
The U.N.'s battling bigwigs →
Inga-Britt Ahlenius, the former U.N. chief of internal oversight, penned
a scathing end-of-mission report last July that accused U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon of
undermining her efforts to…
TshiTshi returns →
Tshisekedi arrived in Kinshasa yesterday after three years in “medical exile.” There is some debate about how many people showed up to greet him at the airport and along the 20km of road between…
Why the City of Cancun is At Risk From Climate... →
CANCUN, Mexico — Yesterday, top diplomats from around the world flew into Cancun to make a final push for progress on in waning days of the 16th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 16) to…
Senate Hearings for US Ambassador for UN... →
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held hearings on the nomination of Joseph M. Torsella as the United States Ambassador for UN Management and Reform (and alternate US Ambassador to the General…
UN Special Rapporteur for Freedom Of Expression:... →
Frank La Rue is the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression. In an interview with the Elanor Hall of the Australian outlet ABC…
Wikileaks And Criminal Intrigue in Chechnya →
This week Ramzan Kadyrov, President of the Chechen Republic, a territory in southern Russia plagued by civil war and instability since nationalists launched a failed bid for secession in the early…
Security Council backs Côte d’Ivoire election... →
Mideast Peace Process: Following up on Robert Serry’s remarks yesterday on the current settlement activity in the West Bank, the SG urgently calling for a negotiated peace and a two-State…
U.N. rights chief slams China, defends Assange →
Navi
Pillay, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, pressed China to
release this year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo, expressing hope
that China will “come to recognize” the…
Is there a Secret Weapon for Fighting Poverty? →
Every so often the international development blogosphere starts talking about labor migration. It’s been obvious for years that it brings cash into the lives of poor people faster than any…
SG acknowledges preliminary election results in... →
Haiti: In a statement issued today which “takes note” of the preliminary election results released yesterday in Haiti, the SG placed emphasis on the fact that the results are not final and…
Diplos, dignitaries and Elvis Costello honor... →
New York’s diplomatic luminaries gathered Tuesday night at
the Pierre Hotel to honor billionaire investor and philanthropist, George
Soros, take in a few songs by Elvis Costello, and assess the WikiLeaks
Kabila's interview →
Yesterday, Belgian journalist Colette Braeckmann published an interview with President Kabila in Le Soir. You can read the whole interview here. Here are some excerpts: Constitutional…
The race for the presidency kicks off →
Although President Kabila said that the election campaign will not begin until mid-2011, one can consider that the unofficial race kicked off today with the arrival of veteran opposition leader…
30 Years After His Death, How John Lennon Supports... →
John Lennon was murdered thirty years ago today. Still, his legacy as a peace activist lives on.
In 2009, Yoko Ono and Lennon’s sons, Sean and Julian, released a 40th anniversary single of the the…
What the Conservative UK Government Can Teach Us... →
Cancun, Mexico: UK Minister Chris Huhne praised UNEP’s “GAP” report saying, “if you knew your house had a 90% chance of catching on fire, would you make a 2% premium payment on insurance?”
…
Interpol is Concerned With More than Assange →
In case you missed it, feminist writer Naomi Wolf penned a mocking letter to Interpol, praising them for “engaging in global manhunts to arrest and prosecute men who behave like narcissistic jerks…
SG urges action across issues in Cancun, Council... →
COP16: Today the SG arrived in Cancun, where he opened the High-Level Segment of the Conference. In his remarks, he said, “Cancun must represent a breakthrough. The status quo will not do….
Mexico’s Message in Cancun: Methane Makes A... →
Ed Note: I’m pleased to introduce Melinda Kimble, who will write dispatches from the international climate talks underway in Cancun. Melinda is a senior vice president at the United Nations…
Do UN sanctions matter for the Congo? The experts... →
Congo Siasa spoke with three members - Steve Hege, Fred Robarts and Greg Mthembu-Salter - of the UN Group of Experts on the Congo about the importance of the sanctions regime, which they monitor,…
Calling Sarah Palin: Alaskan Glaciers Melting Fast →
Sarah Palin does not deny that the climate may be changing. She is just doubtful that humans are the cause and that there should be an international effort to confront climate change.
Still, I…
How A Village in Kenya Changed with the Climate... →
If a global climate change accord is ever to be agreed upon, it will include some sort of mechanism to help developing world countries cope with climate change. In climate negotiator speak, this is…
Will Kim Jong Il End up in the Hague? →
Word is the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court is launching an initial probe into the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island in South Korea last month and the sinking of the Cheonan Naval ship…
Potential agreement on financial support reached... →
SG in Cancun: The SG leaves for Cancun tomorrow morning, where he will address the High-Level Segment of COP16/CMP6. The UN is reporting that the two bodies negotiated draft decisions over the…
Building Blocks for a Climate Agreement →
The former Prime Minister of Norway Gro Brundtland and the former Prime Minister of Chile Ricardo Lagos team up in an op-ed that distills the concrete ways that the international community can…
Goodbye, Meningitis →
Meningitis certainly does not get the same kind of attention as AIDS, TB or Malaria. But it is certainly one of the most frightening diseases out there. Bacterial Meningitis is highly contagious,…
Côte d’Ivoire’s “Classic” Strongman →
Laurent Gbagbo, the incumbent in Côte d’Ivoire’s recent presidential election, is pulling a classic strong-man move. Gbagbo, who has been at the head of the country since 2000, is refusing to accept…
U.N. Human Rights chief declines invite to Nobel... →
Navi Pillay, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human
Rights, has turned down an invitation to attend the Dec. 10 event at which Liu
Xiaobo, the imprisoned Chinese pro-democracy advocate, will be…