The following very personal perspective comes to us from Khalid Mubarak
“He tied his hands then pushed him in the
pond
“Beware, do not get wet, he said!”
The cynical anonymous Arab poet who wrote the lines translated above has lived and passed away centuries before the current international order, which was “born” after the Second World War and still draws and sets rules and laws that control relations between nations despite the fact that most UN member states agree that it is no longer adequate or fair. Ban ki Moon has said it. Even Barack Obama, the president of the country that is the main beneficiary of the outmoded and unsustainable World Order has admitted that it has to change. When he retired, the subservient Kofi Annan wrote in his memoirs that the Security Council would become more and more irrelevant if it didn’t change.
Maulana Mohamed Bushra Dosa, Dr. Muaz Tingo and the Sudanese diplomats and human rights advocates, with their hands tied firmly by an unjust and unsustainable order, listened during the UNHRC’s 22nd session to verbal attacks about the September 2013 subsidies riots that were sparked by an IMF reform recipe. The IMF is the financial extension of the flawed International Order that ties the hands and feet of developing countries, then watched the resulting disorder without comment. The US Congress has stymed the reform of the IMF (accepted even by the US administration) forcing the BRICS groups of countries to start establishing an alternative, more equitable and fair Fund.
Change of the decaying International Order is slow and facing resistance; but cracks are already visible. The suffering caused to the Sudanese by unfair unilateral US sanctions was condemned in Geneva, during the Human Rights session attended by valiant Sudanese delegations and Sudan’s allies. The US was not openly named; but the reference was crystal clear:
“In resolutions (A/HRC/27/L.2) the Council called upon all states to stop adopting, maintaining or implementing unilateral coercive measures not in accordance with international law, international humanitarian law, the Charter of the UN and norms and principles governing peaceful relations among states. Condemns the continued unilateral application and enforcement by certain powers of such measures as tools of political or economic pressure against any country”.
Under pressure from developing countries and from US businesses that saw the short-sighted policies resulting in the Sudan “looking east”, some sanctions were eased; but the main remain. More pressure will result in more retreat until the wall of “banking blockade” is shattered for the benefit of both the Sudanese and US people.
Another relevant point that reared its head in Geneva is the West’s double standards in condemning the Sudan. Our country is facing insurgency and armed warlords (who are encouraged by Western residence and closed eyes policies). Exceptional security threats justify exceptional measures when the West is endangered; but no understanding is shown when the Sudan, facing existential security threats – takes some emergency action. When the West’s security was endangered by the brutal terror of IS, a military response was justifiably agreed upon. When Edward Snowden’s revelations were seen as security breaches by the West, agents openly entered the basement of the most liberal and democratically led newspaper, the Guardian last January and supervised the breaking to pieces of all the relevant hard drives. The media in the most mature democracy in the planet accepted that as a security measure.
The Sudan is a country that has embarked on a process of democratisation, in which it made (since 2005) huge unacknowledged strides, with Western support. There are now tens of political parties including the Communist Party and many critical newspapers. There are even civil society groups financed by Western embassies. The process is still under way and incomplete. Even the International Crisis Group has admitted that the ICCs targeting of the Sudan has emboldened the rebels and made their seeing sense more difficult.
Encouraged by the seamy forces in the West that do not represent the West’s best democratic traditions, especially in the US, rebels are intent on keeping the country’s wounds open, bleeding the economy and squeezing its resources, refusing elections in order to argue that there is no constitutional legitimacy and hoping to thrive in the ensuing chaos.
Instead of confronting them and stopping those who incite and encourage them, the West criticises the government of the Sudan – while tying its hands with unfair unilateral coercive sanctions that no longer go unchallenged.
“Beware, do not get wet, he said!”
The cynical anonymous Arab poet who wrote the lines translated above has lived and passed away centuries before the current international order, which was “born” after the Second World War and still draws and sets rules and laws that control relations between nations despite the fact that most UN member states agree that it is no longer adequate or fair. Ban ki Moon has said it. Even Barack Obama, the president of the country that is the main beneficiary of the outmoded and unsustainable World Order has admitted that it has to change. When he retired, the subservient Kofi Annan wrote in his memoirs that the Security Council would become more and more irrelevant if it didn’t change.
Maulana Mohamed Bushra Dosa, Dr. Muaz Tingo and the Sudanese diplomats and human rights advocates, with their hands tied firmly by an unjust and unsustainable order, listened during the UNHRC’s 22nd session to verbal attacks about the September 2013 subsidies riots that were sparked by an IMF reform recipe. The IMF is the financial extension of the flawed International Order that ties the hands and feet of developing countries, then watched the resulting disorder without comment. The US Congress has stymed the reform of the IMF (accepted even by the US administration) forcing the BRICS groups of countries to start establishing an alternative, more equitable and fair Fund.
Change of the decaying International Order is slow and facing resistance; but cracks are already visible. The suffering caused to the Sudanese by unfair unilateral US sanctions was condemned in Geneva, during the Human Rights session attended by valiant Sudanese delegations and Sudan’s allies. The US was not openly named; but the reference was crystal clear:
“In resolutions (A/HRC/27/L.2) the Council called upon all states to stop adopting, maintaining or implementing unilateral coercive measures not in accordance with international law, international humanitarian law, the Charter of the UN and norms and principles governing peaceful relations among states. Condemns the continued unilateral application and enforcement by certain powers of such measures as tools of political or economic pressure against any country”.
Under pressure from developing countries and from US businesses that saw the short-sighted policies resulting in the Sudan “looking east”, some sanctions were eased; but the main remain. More pressure will result in more retreat until the wall of “banking blockade” is shattered for the benefit of both the Sudanese and US people.
Another relevant point that reared its head in Geneva is the West’s double standards in condemning the Sudan. Our country is facing insurgency and armed warlords (who are encouraged by Western residence and closed eyes policies). Exceptional security threats justify exceptional measures when the West is endangered; but no understanding is shown when the Sudan, facing existential security threats – takes some emergency action. When the West’s security was endangered by the brutal terror of IS, a military response was justifiably agreed upon. When Edward Snowden’s revelations were seen as security breaches by the West, agents openly entered the basement of the most liberal and democratically led newspaper, the Guardian last January and supervised the breaking to pieces of all the relevant hard drives. The media in the most mature democracy in the planet accepted that as a security measure.
The Sudan is a country that has embarked on a process of democratisation, in which it made (since 2005) huge unacknowledged strides, with Western support. There are now tens of political parties including the Communist Party and many critical newspapers. There are even civil society groups financed by Western embassies. The process is still under way and incomplete. Even the International Crisis Group has admitted that the ICCs targeting of the Sudan has emboldened the rebels and made their seeing sense more difficult.
Encouraged by the seamy forces in the West that do not represent the West’s best democratic traditions, especially in the US, rebels are intent on keeping the country’s wounds open, bleeding the economy and squeezing its resources, refusing elections in order to argue that there is no constitutional legitimacy and hoping to thrive in the ensuing chaos.
Instead of confronting them and stopping those who incite and encourage them, the West criticises the government of the Sudan – while tying its hands with unfair unilateral coercive sanctions that no longer go unchallenged.
