A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary
Huffington Post (Michelle Pilecki): "US Media Ignore UN Study on Iraq 'Peace-Building' Methods Backfiring - The United States is avoiding widely recognised peace-building processes that involve external military powers quickly creating a basic security environment and then allowing domestic peace- and nation-building efforts to succeed," says the Inter Press Service News Agency, reporting on a new book, Security Sector Reform and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding, published by the United Nations University Press: "Instead of stabilizing places like Iraq, international efforts to centralize power are creating a more fragile security environment than ever before," the press release quotes co-editor Albrecht Schnabel, senior research fellow at swisspeace Swiss Peace Foundation, and a lecturer at the Institute of Political Science, University of Bern. "[A]lmost three years after the toppling of Saddam Hussein, Iraq is characterized by chaos, violence and disintegration. The methods used to rebuild Iraq's security sector are simply making matters worse."
Free Thinking: "The late Sergio Vieira de Mello said that intolerance is dangerous because it usually hides behind dishonesty and a false pretext. According to him, the best way of securing the rule of law is through human rights."
Dan McDermott: "AP - Polio has been stamped out in Egypt and Niger, leaving just four nations in the world where the deadly disease is endemic, the U.N. health agency said Wednesday."
Global Voices: "South Asia, Bangladesh - Unheard Voices on a Unicef study that indicates there aren't enough toilets for children in schools."
Murky View: "The BBC has an excellent service called BBC Monitoring that gathers information in over 100 languages around the world and translates them into English. Unfortunately, it's not free, but they do include information from those sources in many articles. Yesterday I ran across this article on Iranian bloggers who are discussing the nuclear issue between Iran and the West. As the tension mounts and the issue is sent to the UN Security Council. It is interesting, and I believe incredibly important, to hear what Iranians have to say on the issue. They are, after all, the ones who would be suffering most if a military strike were to proceed against Iran."
"With the international spotlight shining on Tehran's atomic ambitions, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has appealed for a long-term and visionary approach to the problem of nuclear arms proliferation.
"Today's headlines concern Iran - rightly so, for basic treaty obligations and commitments are at stake," he said in London on Tuesday evening, stressing that for signatories of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the right to develop nuclear energy is conditional on the obligation not to build or acquire nuclear weapons, and to comply with standards set and monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).