Turtle Bay Does Beirut
Annan jets off for a Nasrallah crowning?
By Claudia Rosett
National Review Online
August 19, 2006
Brace yourself. In the United Nations-brokered farce known as the “cessation of hostilities in Lebanon,” we may now be heading for the moment in which Secretary-General Kofi Annan jets to Beirut to crown as the heirs of Lebanon the hijackers of the Cedar Revolution — the terrorists of Hezbollah.
Not that the U.N. has exactly expressed it that way. Annan’s office as of Friday afternoon would confirm only that Annan “will likely go to the region in the weeks ahead.” Israeli radio has been reporting that Annan will begin a Middle East tour on Monday in Lebanon, and go from there — in what order is not clear — to Israel, Syria, and Iran.
Whatever Annan might be cooking up, let’s take a closer look at why Secretary Condoleezza Rice ought to suggest to Annan in the strongest possible terms that the next time he packs his bags, it should be not to tour the Middle East, but to leave the U.N. Until then, the world would be a lot better off if he’d stay home. If Rice herself needs a reality check — which after her own recent immersion in Middle East diplomacy seems likely — she could start by looking up the information put out by her own State Department, which accurately lists Hezbollah as a terrorist group dedicated to “eliminating Israel” and setting up “Islamic rule in Lebanon.”
If Annan before stepping down in December is truly desperate to produce a legacy more edifying than Oil-for-Food and Kojo’s Mercedes, he could better spend his remaining four months in office actually enforcing his “zero-tolerance” policy against child rape by U.N. peacekeepers in Africa. Or, unlikely though this is, he could try genuinely cleaning up the bribery-tainted and still secretive U.N. procurement department (which may soon be awarding fat catering contracts to feed the additional 13,000 or so “peacekeepers” the U.N. plans to add to its so-called called interim force in Lebanon, or UNIFIL).
(click here for full story)
Senator Tom Coburn
Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, and International Security
340 Dirksen Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510
Phone: 202-224-2254 Fax: 202-228-3796
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