Morning Coffee - 16 October 2009

Welcome to Morning Coffee, brought to you by Lindsay Beyerstein with additional links from the UN Dispatch team. Every morning we survey foreign affairs and foreign policy news so you don't have to. We begin with the "Starting Five" items of the day -- these may not always appear on A-1, but they *are* the kinds of stories that will be buzzing in foreign capitals, the UN and wherever foreign policy minds roam.
Starting Five
UN ENDORSES GAZA REPORT - The UN Human Rights Council voted to endorse the Goldstone Report on human rights abuses during last winter's Israeli invasion of Gaza. The report found that both Israelis and Palestinians committed atrocities but saved its harshest criticism for Israel. Palestinians lobbied the council to endorse the report while Israel lobbied against it. Link
ITALY DENIES BUYING OFF TALIBAN - Italy hotly denies allegations that it paid Taliban fighters to keep the peace. The government has even threatened to sue the UK newspaper that broke the story. The payments themselves shouldn't be a big deal. The U.S. did the same thing in Iraq during the vaunted Anbar Awakening. The issue is that, according to the paper, is that several French troops got killed because Italy failed to inform France about the plan. Link
A FOOD-FREE RECOVERY - Guatemalans continue to die of starvation. Aid workers say the recent rainy season helped refresh the soil after the recent drought, but people are still going hungry. The harvest is underway, but subsistence farmers are left out of the bounty. Nearly 500 Guatemalans have died of malnutrition this year, according to UN figures. The hardest-hit area is the so-called "dry corridor" in the south of the country. Link
SHE BLINDED ME WITH SCIENCE - The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) announced the names of five outstanding female scientists chosen to receive the L'Oreal/UNESCO Awards for excellence in the life sciences. Each winner will receive a $100,000 prize. Rashika El Ridi of Cairo University in Egypt won for her work on river blindness. American Elaine Fuchs was recognized for her work on skin stem cells. Link
SUCH A DEAL - The far-right, anti-immigration British National Party announced that it will allow non-white people to join for the first time. The BNP was forced to rewrite its constitution after losing a court battle brought by a government rights monitor. The point is largely symbolic, seeing as the party is committed to rolling back the rights of most non-white, non-"indigenous" Britons. The party leadership acquiesced because it wanted to save money to fight for more far-reaching kinds of racism and xenophobia. Link
Provocateurs
Paul B. Stares in LA TIMES
"Just a few months ago, the supreme leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Il, appeared to be a lame duck in both senses of the term. In public appearances, he looked deathly ill after suffering a severe stroke in 2008, and preparations were reportedly underway for one of his sons to succeed him. Fast-forward to today, and Kim is lame no more. Not only has he regained his vigor, judging by his performance during recent visits by Bill Clinton and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, but talk of his succession has also become muted. Kim is unquestionably still the man to do business with in Pyongyang. "
Christopher Sabatini in AMERICAS QUARTERLY
"Howie Mandel wasn’t there, but he may as well have been as yesterday the small group of dedicated Latin Americanists waited to hear if the negotiations had been successful in resolving the crisis in Honduras. The morning opened up with news that the negotiators were optimistic and that they were 90 percent there. Then came the news from the Commander of the Army, General Romeo Vásquez, that a deal to resolve the impasse was close at hand. Then the news! A deal had been struck. Then the downer. No deal, said de facto President Roberto Micheletti. "
Nicolas Pelham and Max Rodenbeck in NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS
"Amid the wreckage of Gaza, Hamas's officials struggle to sound upbeat. The burly interior minister, Fathi Hamad, whose predecessor was killed by an Israeli bomb, defiantly shuns security precautions at his makeshift office in Gaza City's main police station. "Claims that we are trying to establish an Islamic state are false," says the minister, who says his preference would be pursuing a degree in media studies. "Hamas is not the Taliban. It is not al-Qaeda. It is an enlightened, moderate Islamic movement." "
Water Cooler

Former UN diplomat Peter Galbraith admits that he had a financial stake in a Kurdish oil field while he was helping to craft the Iraqi constitution. Galbraith is a former ambassador to Iraq and a prominent proponent of Kurdish autonomy. An independent Kurdistan would improve his investments in the oil venture. Galbraith was recently fired from the UN body overseeing the Afghan presidential election after he accused his boss of covering up massive vote fraud. There's no indication that Galbraith had any conflicts of interest in Afghanistan.

  • Related Sites
  • UNITED NATIONS FOUNDATIONS
  • UN WIRE
  • Join Us On
  • t
  • f