New UN report on biggest conflict since Second World War

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Purple

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There is a new UN Report on the conflict is The Congo between the early 90's and now. They are accusing the Rwandan government of genocide or, as Bill Clinton and Madelyn Albright would say, "Acts of genocide" in Congo.
Personally I have almost no respect for the UN and how they conduct their business. I will read the report when I can get my hands on it but unless they are seeking to have Kofi Annan tried as an active accomplice in the genocide I will continue to presume it's just more of the same self-serving corrupt garbage that the UN spins in these reports.
Kofi Annan was the head of Peacekeeping in the UN at the time of the genocide and he conspired with the French to keep the details of what was going on out of the hands of the international media. He has the blood of tens of thousands on his hands.
After the RPA, the Tutsi led rebel army that over through the genocide Hutu government (which was backed by France in the form of money, arms and possibly as many as thousands of French special forces on the ground) there was a stream of Hutu extremist refugees into Congo, especially Goma. Despite the fact that it is against the UN's own rules to set up refugee camps on international borders they poured up to a billion dollars into Gome and enriched the Hutu extremists again in the process. The Hutu's then attacked Rwanda again, killing tens of thousands of Tutsi's and moderate Hutu's over the following months. The UN did almost nothing about this(the French and Chinese continued to sell them arms). Eventually the Rwandans invaded and, in one particular case, slaughtered the Hutu inhabitants of a refugee camp. Considering what had happened it was not surprising; imagine if, in 1945, thousands of well armed Jews got access to a camp where the SS guards who ran the concentration camps were living with their families.

Once Rwanda invaded the Congo (or Zaire as it was then)the country collapsed into a quagmire and Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania all backed different factions to a lesser or greater extent in order to reap the rewards of one of the most mineral rich countries on Earth.

If the UN had not screwed up so badly in Rwanda literally millions of lives would have been saved. The French are still leading the charge in attempting to blacken the name of the Tutsi government in Rwanda in general and Paul Kagame in particular (the man General Norman Schwarzkopf described as the greatest practitioner of manoeuvre warfare on the modern age) and the UN have their own reasons for going along with it.

For more information on the Genocide:

Shake Hands with the Devil is good but this is far better.
 
And here it is. I dont disagree with any of the points you make on this post. But if this is what you regard as posting a thread on poverty as per your pm to me then you will not get much of a response.

This is an site almost exclusively dedicated to Irish issues, as you well know. I personally have been very busy work wise this month, long may it last. Pleased that someone has little else to do than pm people regarding random posts.

If you have a boss you should ask for some more work, however menial, it will occupy your mind. If you are the boss, well then thank God most aren't as unoccupied as you would appear to be.

Have a good day Purple......................
 
Hi Lightswitch,

I have posted in other threads that there is little true poverty in Ireland. I usually do so in the context of discussions about poverty here. You countered with a post that I only bring up points about the plight of people in other countries in response to posts about poverty here, which is true, and that if I wanted to discuss such topics then I should start a thread. I started this thread to show that people on AAM have little or no interest in such topics and so starting such a thread is a waste of time.

Poverty in Ireland is a social condition that can be alleviated through education and mind-set from one generation to the next. Ireland is a stable country, both economically and politically. What is happening now is nothing in comparison to what was inflicted on the people of the Congo. Their poverty is the result of military conflict, mass movement of refugees and political chaos. It has nothing to do with mind-sets or education or work ethics.
What happened in Rwanda and Congo is by no means unique in areas of conflict where political and civil structures break down. It should be born in mind when talking about poverty that it is a very relative term. That includes our definition of relative poverty.

I’ll ignore your personalised comments other than to say that I do take a lunch break from 1.00 to 1.45, a tea break in the morning from 10.00 to 10.15 and if I work past 7.00 in the evening I also usually take a short break around 4.30 or 5.00. I start between 7.30 and 8.00 in the morning. I don’t have a boss. If you would like any additional information about how I spend my day please PM me and I’ll be happy to oblige.
 
Purple, you do give me a laugh sometimes, this being one of them:)

Occasionally people post regarding issues relating to other Countries and from what I have seen being advised is that this is a site dealing with Irish issues. You can trawl through previous posts and prove me wrong if you wish, I don't mind.

With regard to the UN I agree with your points. I know a couple of very well educated people who have worked in very deprived areas for the UN and want to work for them again, simply because it was such a cushy number for them. Highly paid work, house keepers, gardeners, cooks provided for next to nothing. excellent accommodation, the best of food. All while people starved, or close to it within a couple of miles or so away from them. One of them actually threw in a comment about feeling "guilt" given that she had been a history teacher and felt bad regarding the Irish famine, but that didn't stop her wanting to go back. "The lifestyle and social scene for the UN workers is that good apparently!! But this is just hear say from my point of view, I have not experienced it myself.

You are correct I probably have on more than one occasion commented that you are somewhat harsh on what I would call underprivileged people or people who simply do not have the ability (you would probably call it desire) to do things for themselves.

You are also fairly correct imo when you say that poverty can be corrected from one generation to the next. There are two problems that jump out at me.

1, We have a large adult population who are now having children who fall into the unable / unwilling category mentioned earlier. These are now the carers of the next generation. We have as a country gone through the situation where the state did step in and take these children into care in the past in some instances. We all know the outcome of what happened there. Or have been living under a stone for the past 10 years if we don't. Do you have a suggestion as to how this can be addressed?

2, There is only room at the top for very few. Room in the middle for quite a few more. And then there is the bottom of the pile where are lot of people reside. Including a lot of people right now who would have considered themselves quite wealthy a few years ago. The number is growing. I would also appreciate your suggestions as to how this is to be addressed?

With regard to personal comments about you. I have no idea who you are, sometimes I disagree with you, it is an open discussion forum, it probably would not last long if everyone agreed on everything.

I won't be pm'ing you with regard to your work schedule............ but you do list your location as being "in your own little world" and I can't disagree with that.

I do think like a lot of people on here we both would like to see a better world / Ireland. To put it in very simple terms you would use the stick approach whereas I would use the carrot, this may stem from our upbringings or our experiences of what works for us in life, I don't know.

It would be nice if you answered the questions I asked above. Previously you have never done so. I appreciate the answers are difficult, no one seems to have come up with them yet.
 
Both of your questions are indeed complex and there’s no easy or quick solution.

Education is the answer to the first but not the education that the state has been offering. I am a liberal and so I favour small government and am uncomfortable in general with social engineering but we need to teach our children civics (for want of a better word). One of the main problems we face as a nation is that many people have little or no sense of civic responsibility. Many of us see little wrong with stealing from the state or sitting back and living off the hard work of others. We also have to stop spending 80% of the increases in educational spending on pay increases and concentrate on reducing class sizes at primary levels in deprived/ difficult areas. I have heard various people saying that the curriculum needs to be looked at as well. If we don’t find a way to educate civic responsibility into ourselves then the government will legislate it in for us. An example of this would be the legislation we now have around public order, noise pollution etc. People used to know that you should show consideration for others, now they have to be laws in place to make them behave in a certain way.

With regard to your second question I agree that there will always be those at the top, middle and bottom. That in itself is not a problem. The issue is how to construct a society that allows people at the bottom to move up when they wish to and how do we ensure that people are financially better off providing for themselves than they would be when the state is providing for them. This is where that dirty phrase comes in; “the market”. If the state provides people with more than they are worth in the open market then they will not work. If the state provides more for its citizens than those citizens can collectively afford through taxation then there will also be a problem. We need to stop asking how the state can provide for those at the bottom and start asking how the state can help those at the bottom provide for themselves. Until we get that change in mindset we’ll go nowhere. What the specifics are I do not know but we should not be afraid to admit when we have got things wrong or changed things that worked instead of just throwing more and more money at it in the hope that that will somehow make things work. There are plenty of examples of that in education, welfare and healthcare.
To expand on your question a bit I also think that those who have recently lost their job should get considerably more than those that are long term unemployed. A sliding scale of say 80% of your previous income in the first year going down to 50% over three years and then basic levels of welfare would be a good idea. Obviously if basic levels of welfare are higher than 50% then people should get that.
 
I read with interest your initial post Purple as I lived and worked in Rwanda for the two years directly after the genocide. Unfortunately the posts that follow have nothing really to do with the topic so what the original post bait to guarantee what followed or is there really a discussion to be had about Rwanda?

Whilst I do agree with some if not all of what you have said about the UN in relation to its handling of the Rwandan genocide (and I was there in the aftermath) there are quite a number of UN workers who passionately care about what happens there and beyond and who have worked to ensure that human rights abuses are brought to public attention..... If the UN didn't report on the conflict in the Congo then we either wouldn't know or if we did find out we would wonder why they weren't reporting it......
 
and it always amazes me that when the anniversary of the start of the genocide comes around in early April every hear, how easy it is for the world to forget that almost one million world citizens lost their lives in following three months in 1994....the news coverage is miniscule..... now if this happened in the US.... hmmmmmm
 
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