Is the Existence of Iran a Mere Myth? Conceivably
The United Nations is bidding farewell to its long-serving Secretary General, Kofi Annan, and readying itself to welcome his successor, Ban Ki-moon. The future is a great unknown. Kofo Annan was without doubt a well-intentioned and honest person. The best of intentions don't necessarily translate to a job well done, and in Mr. Annan's case, it can be said with all honesty that the job was not well done.
During Mr. Annan's tenure, we saw the world in great turmoil, as nations fed in furious anger one upon the other. In Cambodia, in Bosnia there was carnage. In Somalia the world watched without hope as humankind devoured itself. The Hutus and the Tutsis taught us further how frail our tolerance is for one another, our reluctance to accept differences between ourselves.
Wars in the Congo, in Liberia, in Sudan, go forward without surcease, despite the most well-intentioned and frantic efforts of the United Nations. Darfur is a telling case in point where the Sudanese government was politely asked time and again to call off its deadly offensive, but calmy refused, claiming the rights of sovereinty.
The member countries of the United Nations meet in that august company in the calming influence of its serene representation of the best that human beings can attain to; tolerance and brotherhood. Member country representatives, courteously circle one another, knowing full well the human-rights records representative of each, yet offering diplomatic niceties.
A standoffish respect is the order of the day within the United Nations. Yet there is one nation among the many whose presence is viewed and treated by a representative group of developing countries as that of a pariah. This is not a country whose human-rights record, whose history and tradition has brought it to such a pass, but rather a country whose geographic presence offends.
This is the only country continually singled out for group censure. This is the only country whose member states can point to as being guilty of trumped-up charges absurd in nature, but acceptable nonetheless to the charging states and those in their economic, political or religiously-motivated thrall. The mother body of the human-rights commissions which undertake perenially to publicly censure the State of Israel has done nothing to curtail these offensively one-sided activities.
But worse is the fact that the United Nations had done nothing at all to protest the fact that one member country is permitted to stand in its hallowed halls and proclaim the illegitimacy of another, and its intention to clear the region entirely of the presence of this offending country. The president of Iran, a ranting, raving affront to decency and intelligent debate has time and again delivered his opinion that Israel should be wiped off the map, and he'd be happy to do it.
Yet not once has the United Nations, Secretary General Kofi Annan, nor any of his high-ranking officials issued a rebuke to Iran. Why might that be? Iran's president Ahmadinejad claims that the Holocaust is a myth, an event that never happened, a fabrication which Israel has used to blackmail guilt-minded countries which failed to come to the rescue of millions of men, women and children whose lives were extinguished by a racist madman and his henchmen.
Quite the myth, that. Of course, for that matter how do any of us really know that we exist? Does Iran exist, or is it a myth of epic proportions? This may be possible, after all: any country which asserts such rubbish, which behaves in such a criminally abrasive manner toward its neighbours, toward the world at large, must be the figment of someone's deranged imagination. In short, a pitiable myth.
In spite of which, it would be refreshing, intellectually invigorating, possibly peace-enabling, for the new Secretary General, Mr. Ban Ki-moon, to demonstrate the intellectual courage that appeared to elude his predecessor. Would it not be fitting, as an introduction to his new tenure at the helm of the United Nations, to see Mr. Ban Ki-moon denounce the flouting of decent behaviour by member states, and in particular that of Iran?
He could, conceivably, invite Mr. Ahmadinejad to enter the world of the 21st century as an honest and trustworthy member of the collective, or excuse himself from the gathering and spout his criminal rhetoric as the pariah he truly is.
It is up to Mr. Ban Ki-moon to uphold the principles upon which the United Nations was founded and the purpose for which it came into existence. It's past time the world awakened from its silent acquiescence to the threats of state annihilation of a member country by Iran.
posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, December 12, 2006
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