Good riddance, Kofi Annan

[zcwilly]

06:29 AM CST on Monday, December 18, 2006
Excerpted from the Dec. 12 Chicago Tribune editorial page


Kofi Annan held forth last week on his favorite topic: What he sees as America's offenses against human rights and the rule of law in its war on global terrorism.

Thanks for the thoughts, Kofi. But this exercise in diplo-scolding comes from a world leader whose most distinguishing trait is his failure to lead. Under Mr. Annan, U.N. timidity – what oil-for-food prober Paul Volcker called a "culture of inaction" – aggravated one crisis after another:

•The corruption of Mr. Annan's bureaucracy in the oil-for-food scandal is Exhibit A. While U.N. swells slept (or shared in the booty), Saddam Hussein funneled fortunes looted from his own people to influential pals in Russia, France and China.

•Sudanese officials may have slaughtered Muslim villagers "with genocidal intent," a U.N. panel reported in 176 pages of blather. But the mass killings in Darfur aren't "genocide." How convenient. A finding of genocide would have forced the rest of the world to act. Russia, France and China didn't want embargoes or sanctions to gum up their trade with Sudan – and Mr. Annan didn't apply the muscular diplomacy that might have persuaded those governments to help stop the killing.

•A 2004 internal U.N. report admits that the body is hamstrung by "an unwillingness to get serious about preventing deadly violence." Two years later, nothing has changed.

•Iran ignores an Aug. 31 Security Council deadline to halt uranium enrichment. Does Mr. Annan demand sanctions? No, he flies to Tehran and announces that Iran's president "reaffirmed to me Iran's preparedness and determination to negotiate" a solution to the nuclear confrontation. What? In Mahmoud Ahmadinejad we trust?

•North Korea sets off a nuclear device. Kofi Annan's United Nations ... blinks. No pressure, no punishment. How better to teach other rogue governments and their mad-hatter rulers that acquiring nukes is the best way to snub the world?

•A new U.N. Human Rights Council replaces a disgraced Human Rights Commission that coddled member nations with dreadful records of oppression. Except Mr. Annan's new panel blames almost every indignity it mulls on Israel. Even Mr. Annan fusses briefly. And then does nothing.

Thanks for the memories, Mr. Annan. But as of Dec. 31, goodbye.