blackascoal
The Force is With Me
UN chief heading to Iran despite US, Israeli objections
August 23, 2012
excerpts --
Efforts led by the United States and Israel to isolate Iran suffered a setback on Wednesday when the United Nations announced that Ban Ki-moon, the secretary general, would join officials from 120 countries in Tehran next week for a summit meeting that Iran has trumpeted as a vindication of its defiance and enduring importance in world affairs.
Mr. Ban’s decision to attend the meeting of the Nonaligned Movement, announced by his spokesman, Martin Nesirky, came despite objections from both the Americans and Israelis, including a phone call from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. It was announced a few days after the new president of Egypt, a country that has long been estranged from Iran, said he would attend the summit meeting as well, a decision that had already unsettled the Israelis.
Taken together, the moves reinforced Iran’s contention that a reordering of powers is under way in the Middle East, where Western influence is waning, and that the American-Israeli campaign to vilify Iran as a rogue state that exports terrorism and secretly covets nuclear weapons is not resonating in much of the world.
The meeting of the Nonaligned Movement, a group formed during the cold war, includes a number of other countries that the United States has sought to marginalize, among them North Korea and Sudan, whose president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, is wanted under a war crimes indictment by the International Criminal Court. Although Iran’s hosting of the meeting is strictly a coincidence of history — under a rotating system, Iran presides over the group through 2014 — Iranian leaders have portrayed it as a privilege that repudiates the American narrative.
“The extraordinary effort that the Iranian leaders have put into the summit is intended to showcase Iran’s global role and offer concrete evidence that the U.S. policy of isolating Iran has failed,” said Farideh Farhi, an independent Iranian scholar at the University of Hawaii.
“A case is being made that it is not the ‘global community’ that has problems with the Islamic republic, as repeatedly asserted by U.S. officials, but merely a U.S.-led-and-pressured coalition of countries,” she said. “And ironically the Obama administration is conceding the point by trying to pressure various leaders from attending the meeting.”
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There was no immediate reaction to Mr. Ban’s decision from Israel. But according to Mr. Netanyahu’s office, he had telephoned Mr. Ban on Aug. 10 and told him that such a trip, even if well intentioned, would be a mistake. “Your visit will grant legitimacy to a regime that is the greatest threat to world peace and security,” Mr. Netanyahu was quoted as saying.
Even before Mr. Ban made his decision known, the Israeli government was asserting that the sanctions effort against Iran was not working, a conclusion that was reinforced for the Israelis because of the decision to attend the summit meeting in Iran by President Mohamed Morsi of Egypt.
“If you’re going there, if you’re paying homage to the leaders of Iran, what kind of diplomatic isolation is that?” Mark Regev, Mr. Netanyahu’s spokesman, said of Mr. Morsi’s decision.
The reaction to Mr. Ban’s announcement was more muted from the Obama administration, which had engaged in a less public effort to dissuade him.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48760347/ns/world_news-the_new_york_times/
Is America still the "leader of the free world?"
August 23, 2012
excerpts --
Efforts led by the United States and Israel to isolate Iran suffered a setback on Wednesday when the United Nations announced that Ban Ki-moon, the secretary general, would join officials from 120 countries in Tehran next week for a summit meeting that Iran has trumpeted as a vindication of its defiance and enduring importance in world affairs.
Mr. Ban’s decision to attend the meeting of the Nonaligned Movement, announced by his spokesman, Martin Nesirky, came despite objections from both the Americans and Israelis, including a phone call from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. It was announced a few days after the new president of Egypt, a country that has long been estranged from Iran, said he would attend the summit meeting as well, a decision that had already unsettled the Israelis.
Taken together, the moves reinforced Iran’s contention that a reordering of powers is under way in the Middle East, where Western influence is waning, and that the American-Israeli campaign to vilify Iran as a rogue state that exports terrorism and secretly covets nuclear weapons is not resonating in much of the world.
The meeting of the Nonaligned Movement, a group formed during the cold war, includes a number of other countries that the United States has sought to marginalize, among them North Korea and Sudan, whose president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, is wanted under a war crimes indictment by the International Criminal Court. Although Iran’s hosting of the meeting is strictly a coincidence of history — under a rotating system, Iran presides over the group through 2014 — Iranian leaders have portrayed it as a privilege that repudiates the American narrative.
“The extraordinary effort that the Iranian leaders have put into the summit is intended to showcase Iran’s global role and offer concrete evidence that the U.S. policy of isolating Iran has failed,” said Farideh Farhi, an independent Iranian scholar at the University of Hawaii.
“A case is being made that it is not the ‘global community’ that has problems with the Islamic republic, as repeatedly asserted by U.S. officials, but merely a U.S.-led-and-pressured coalition of countries,” she said. “And ironically the Obama administration is conceding the point by trying to pressure various leaders from attending the meeting.”
---
There was no immediate reaction to Mr. Ban’s decision from Israel. But according to Mr. Netanyahu’s office, he had telephoned Mr. Ban on Aug. 10 and told him that such a trip, even if well intentioned, would be a mistake. “Your visit will grant legitimacy to a regime that is the greatest threat to world peace and security,” Mr. Netanyahu was quoted as saying.
Even before Mr. Ban made his decision known, the Israeli government was asserting that the sanctions effort against Iran was not working, a conclusion that was reinforced for the Israelis because of the decision to attend the summit meeting in Iran by President Mohamed Morsi of Egypt.
“If you’re going there, if you’re paying homage to the leaders of Iran, what kind of diplomatic isolation is that?” Mark Regev, Mr. Netanyahu’s spokesman, said of Mr. Morsi’s decision.
The reaction to Mr. Ban’s announcement was more muted from the Obama administration, which had engaged in a less public effort to dissuade him.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48760347/ns/world_news-the_new_york_times/
Is America still the "leader of the free world?"
