What a fool . He's an improvement over Kofi Annan but barely. The high-stakes visit to Burma comes at a critical time for Ban, whose low-key approach to his job has been criticised as ineffectual. He came under further fire on arrival in Naypyidaw, the regime's headquarters, when he told the head of the junta, General Than Shwe: "I appreciate your commitment to moving your country forward."...
My husband heard a good line yesterday; 'Corruption is the glue that is holding this Coalition Government together.' I know that Kofi Annan has set another deadline of August for setting up a local tribunal to try key personalities guilty of organising post election violence - but after so long, I can't see much in the way of decisive action happening. Perhaps leaders are hoping to continue spinning...
30 African Heads of State currently attending an African Union Summit in Sirte, Libya, among them President Kibaki, said they "shall not co-operate" with the ICC "for the arrest and surrender of indicted personalities". African leaders discussed a drastic new decision against ICC that would, in practice, give Sudan President Omar Bashir impunity from prosecution for war crimes at...
Three Kenyan ministers left the country last night for Geneva, Switzerland, on a mission to convince chief mediator Kofi Annan to give the government more time to form a local tribunal.
Former UN chief Kofi Annan has challenged African leaders over the position and existence of the International Criminal Court, ICC; an institution the latter have dismissed as a fixated machination by the west.
Two international conferences took place in South Africa last month and at both conferences the small farmer was the main subject of debate. Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan attended one of them, the World Economic Forum on Africa (WEF), which ended on June 12, 2009.
Human Security Gateway: All Updates (Free subscription) | 07/01/2009
Ever since the concept of the Protection of Civilians (PoC) was coined by then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in an attempt to place civilians in armed conflict at the core of UN peacekeeping, there have been diverging interpretations of the meaning of the concept and its intended application. Simply put, PoC has meant different things in theory at UN headquarters and practice in the field. In the...
We all know that famous phrase if not from personal experience then from countless TV shows. There is, however, one group of people who seems unaware of it and that is Her Majesty’s Ministers and their advisers. On Thursday there was a reply to a Written Question put down by Lord Stoddart of Swindon. The question was interesting in that it implied (oh heck, said quite clearly) that a previous...
In the past fifty years, more than $1 trillion in development-related aid has been transferred from rich countries to Africa. Has this assistance improved the lives of Africans? No. In fact, across the continent, the recipients of this aid are not better off as a result of it, but worse—much worse. The above quote is taken from Dambisa Moyo 's book, " Dead Aid: Why aid is not working and...
[JURIST] Kenyan troops tortured, raped, and committed other human rights violations against civilians during an operation to quell ethnic fighting in the country's northeastern Mandera Triangle region, according to a report released Monday by Human Rights Watch (HRW). HRW compiled testimony from victims in the region, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) operating in the area, and representatives...
Evaluating the S-G's performance thus far, Stephen Schlesinger looks at some of the places where Ban has accomplished quite a lot, but which haven't received that much attention: places like Kosovo, Haiti, and Sri Lanka, where Ban's frequent trips have all brought about at least some level of improvement in extraordinarily complex circumstances. Schlesinger sees the point that many like to make, that...
This was the call to action from Sir Bob Geldof, as he and Kofi Annan appealed to the ad industry to use our collective powers of persuasion and influence in the "fight for climate justice"
A new global campaign to halt climate change, dubbed ‘tck tck tck’, has been launched at Cannes by Kofi Annan, Bob Geldof and Havas global CEO David Jones.
Bob Geldof and - tonight playing the role of someone who you'd hope would know better - Kofi Annan have flown to Cannes in a bid to try and stop stop climate change by, erm, putting a small logo on their adverts: In fact, Annan and Geldof want this to be more than a campaign. They want a climate justice movement to be born amid the acres of polished marble and €15 vodka and tonics of the French...
Nestled among the countless start-up profiles over on TechCrunch is a lovely look from Sarah Lacy at what the east African country of Rwanda is doing to get Rwandans online and connected . There's the promising: cheap cell phones, extensive fiber rollout, Rwandan students being sent to the Indian Institutes of Technology for training. And the cultural and structural challenges that made tech difficult,...
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