UN oddly rejects Russia’s concerns and proposals regarding Ukrainian ultranationalist violence, bio-weapon labs, and Nord Stream explosions
In this series I’ve been identifying and refuting the claims made in the National Security Strategy 2022. I refer to the NSS as the Sullivan & Biden NSS, even though it’s not known whether or not Biden’s National Security Advisor, Jake Sullivan, took part in writing the document.
The previous essay refuted the claim implied in the NSS that the US government (the USG) and Ukraine are the good guys who defend the UN Charter and Russia is the bad guy who violates it. In fact, this and other NSS claims serve only to promote the fictional drama, called a Cultural Script,[1] in which the US and NATO are cast in the role of noble heroes, Ukrainians play the part of innocent victims, and Russia, as always, is given the role of the evil persecutor—and one who must be defeated and destroyed by the gold-hearted heroes and victims. This fairy tale is just that, a fairy tale, a fictitious perception of conflict. It’s also an indicator of psychological immaturity.
In the effort to help prove the falseness of the good vs. evil stereotypes of the Cultural Script and to create US foreign policy based upon a psychologically mature awareness of the nature of conflict, this essay will continue to refute:
NSS False Claim #9: The USG is helping Ukraine fight Russia because of the USG’s steadfast commitment to defending the UN Charter.
And we’ll continue to refute these quotes found in the NSS 2022:
“This is not about a struggle between the West and Russia. It is about fundamental principles of the UN Charter, which Russia is a party to, particularly respect for sovereignty, territorial integrity, and the prohibition against acquiring territory through war.”[2]
“The basic laws governing relations among nations, including the United Nations Charter and the protection it affords all states from being invaded by their neighbors or having their borders redrawn by force, are under attack.”[3]
In the effort to help prove Claim #9 to be false, NSS Essay Part 9 described a few of the numerous significant USG violations of the UN Charter—committed with impunity. We’ll turn now to the question of whether the UN Security Council and General Assembly are being used to support the UN Charter or to support the goals of the US government.
In particular, what happens when the Russian government seeks help from the UN for significant problems? Does the UN provide Russia with any support whatsoever when faced with severe potential danger, when trying to resolve a crime, and when seeking to resolve a humanitarian crisis? Does the UN provide Russia with effective means and international support to resolve crises and problems non-violently?
No help from the UN in stopping the violence of Ukrainian ultranationalists and neo-Nazis. As noted in the NSS Essay 9, the USG is allowed to violate the UN charter with impunity. And it seems that Ukraine also basks in this immunity from condemnation and prosecution. Ukrainians within the government and political parties, such as the Svoboda Party, and within the ultranationalist violent militant groups, such as Right Sector, that were involved with orchestrating and/or perpetrating the 2014 coup have not been held accountable for their violations of national and international law.[4] Instead, they’ve been promoted to political and military positions of power.
With the violence of the coup never accounted for, ultranationalists were given free rein to head off to direct their hatred and violence onto the people of Donetsk and Lugansk when these republics resisted the coup and declared their independence in 2014. These horrendous and numerous behaviors of hatred and violence, including large amounts of anti-Semitism, the use of Nazi symbolism, attacks upon Jewish centers and cemeteries, and attacks upon Russians, Romani, LG+ members, and feminists, are further described in the previous essay, Part 2B, “The Violence of Ukrainian Ultranationalists.”
Well prior to Russia’s military actions of 2022, hatred against Russia had become particularly venomous amongst far right-wing extremists. In 2015, Reuters quoted a member of the St. Mary’s battalion who stated that he’d like to create a Christian “Taliban” to reclaim eastern Ukraine and Crimea. “‘I would like Ukraine to lead the crusades. . . .Our mission is not only to kick out the occupiers, but also revenge. Moscow must burn.’” [5]
Throughout the eight-year civil war, Ukrainians, particularly in Donetsk and Lugansk, have feared for their lives and safety because of Ukrainian extreme right-wing violence. Groups such as the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, the Svoboda Party, Right Sector, Azov battalion, C14, the police regiments Dnipro 1 and Dnipro 2, and the Tornado, Donbass, and Aidar battalions are all linked with fascism and far right-wing violent extremism.[6]
Most of these far-right-wing groups state they are ultranationalists, not neo-Nazis, but some of the groups do include neo-Nazis. These groups’ views are not representative of the broad spectrum of views within the Ukrainian population, and therefore their political domination cannot be considered democratic, let alone peace-oriented. In 2015, for example, the Svoboda Party won 10 percent of the vote, and that was much more than it had ever gained previously.[7]
Once Yanukovich was ousted in 2014, Arseniy Yatsenyuk of the Fatherland Party was installed, presumably the same Yatsenyuk that Biden’s Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland described in the recorded phone conversation prior to the coup regarding her preferences for Ukraine’s leadership.[8] Yatsenyuk then rewarded the Svoboda Party with three high-level positions—about one-quarter of the Cabinet positions—in the interim government.[9]
In 2014, NBC reported that the Svoboda party’s goals listed on its website included preserving Ukraine’s national identity, protecting Ukraine’s “living space”—the lingo used by Hitler, and criminalizing any displays of “Ukrainophobia.” Russophobia, however, seems to be encouraged, for one Svoboda Party member even assaulted a Ukrainian state TV station merely for broadcasting a speech given by Putin.[10]
According to Russ Bellant, the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, an intolerant, violent organization from the 1920s that backed the all-Ukrainian 14th Waffen SS Division during WWII, is behind the Svoboda Party, a party supported by the US government and a party that was a force within the 2014 coup. In fact, Bellant has written about the significant consequences on US policy, propaganda, and USG mentalities of the ties between right-wing Nazi-collaborating Eastern European immigrants with US Republican Party campaigns since the 1950s.[11]
Despite the ultranationalists’ prejudiced hatred against so many groups of people, including Russians, Jews, Romani, feminists, and members of the LG+ community, US policy and media makers, whether deceitfully or ignorantly, portray the 2014 coup as “the Revolution of Dignity” and a victory for freedom, democracy, and humanity.
Did the Obama, Trump, or Biden administrations ever issue one word of condemnation against the violence of the post-coup Ukraine government and its associated militant ultranationalist groups? Not to my awareness. Do Sullivan & Biden speak in their NSS about Ukraine’s violations of international law and the UN Charter? Not one word. If they really cared about the UN Charter and international law, they would consistently condemn violations, for this is how true justice operates, independent of the identity of the actor who violates the law. Using law to go after one’s enemies while protecting one’s allies when they violate that same law is an extremely immature and unjust form of handling law.
In his February 24, 2022 speech, Putin eloquently stated that since the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, Russia gets nothing but the cold shoulder from the USG, who treats Russia’s ideas on treaties and security proposals with disdain, disrespect, and neglect.[12] But from what I’ve read, the USG manner towards Russia is even worse than Putin lets on. If you want to see the type of reception Russia gets from the USG at the UN Security Council when Russia wants to discuss severe problems of violence, when it seeks cooperative solutions, just take a look at these remarks by the US Mission to the UN, which includes five US ambassadors, on July 11, 2022.
“Colleagues, I’ll be brief since we’ve already sat through this same meeting multiple times already and Russia continues to abuse its Council seat to hold meetings that waste our time and attention.
“Let’s be clear on what this meeting is and is not. It is not a serious attempt to hold a discussion on Neo-Nazism and violent extremism. It is a cynical attempt by Russia to use the Council as a platform to broadcast its state propaganda and to justify its brutal, unprovoked, and premeditated war of aggression against Ukraine.
“We reject Russia’s repeated efforts to distort history for its own political purposes. . . .”[13]
Is it just me or are others equally appalled and sickened at the extreme levels of both rudeness and ignorance, not to mention lack of intelligence, in these remarks that are intended to represent Americans at the UN?
The members of the US Mission to UN clearly have rocks in their heads. It’s not my nature to put people down for being stupid, for people are wise and valuable in a variety of ways. However, when their stupidity is combined with rudeness, cruelty, and power, then their stupidity places a lot of people—in this case, the entire world in danger.
It would be bad enough to hear such words at a meeting at any level of government, but for such words to be uttered at the Security Council, a group that supposedly has the very top representatives of our nation seeking peace, harmony, and justice, is shameful, shocking, and entirely immature. If the words “United States” had been substituted for “Russia” and the nation “Iraq” had been substituted for “Ukraine” and “weapons of mass destruction” had been substituted for “Neo-Nazism and violent extremism,” then these remarks would at least have been honest if leveled against the USG in 2003. As they stand, they are false and entirely rude and disrespectful.
Instead of wasting time on pointing out everything that’s dumb about these remarks, I’ll just refer you to my previous essay, Part 2B, which discusses the atrocities committed in Ukraine during and prior to the civil war by several groups of Ukrainian ultranationalists, including neo-Nazis. I’ll also include here quotations from an article from 2018 which sums up the circumstances in that year. I was surprised to see the article on the Atlantic Council website, for I’d assumed from what I’d previously read that this organization had a black-and-white view of the world in which Russia was always evil and Ukraine always good. So kudos to them for posting it, for it’s this kind of open-mindedness to the good and bad on each side that can give us the information we need to truly resolve problems.
“Ukraine’s Ministry of Youth and Sports is funding the neo-Nazi group C14 to promote ‘national patriotic education projects’ in the country. . . .
“The revelation represents a dangerous example of law enforcement tacitly accepting or even encouraging the increasing lawlessness of far-right groups to use violence against those they don’t like.
“Since the beginning of 2018, C14 and other far-right groups such as the Azov-affiliated National Militia, Right Sector, Karpatska Sich, and others have attacked Roma groups several times, as well as anti-fascist demonstrations, city council meetings, an event hosted by Amnesty International, art exhibits, LGBT events, and environmental activists. On March 8, violent groups launched attacks against International Women’s Day marches in cities across Ukraine. In only a few of these cases did police do anything to prevent the attacks, and in some they even arrested peaceful demonstrators rather than actual perpetrators.
“. . . C14’s dangerous leader Yevhen Karas even boasts openly about cooperating with the Security Services of Ukraine (SBU). . . .
“. . . After the March 8 attacks, Amnesty International warned that ‘Ukraine is sinking into a chaos of uncontrolled violence posed by radical groups and their total impunity. Practically no one in the country can feel safe under these conditions.’ Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Freedom House, and Front Line Defenders warned in a letter that radical groups acting under ‘a veneer of patriotism’ and ‘traditional values’ were allowed to operate under an ‘atmosphere of near total impunity.’”[14]
In fact, three UN human relations experts, all Special Rapporteurs appointed by the Human Rights Council, condemned the violence of C14, which used to be the youth wing of the Svoboda Party, and stated in 2018, “‘We unequivocally condemn these heinous acts of intimidation and violence against members of the Roma minority in Ukraine.’”[15] Months later, a human rights group reported that C14, in collaboration with Kiev’s police, was allegedly intimidating the Romani.[16]
It might help the US Mission to the UN to understand that the Roma (Gypsies) were the people who, in terms of percentage of their group killed, suffered the most during Hitler’s Nazi Holocaust. The killing of Roma is horrendous enough, but it should also serve as a warning that other groups are also likely targeted by these far-right groups. And, in fact, Russians, Roma, Jews, feminists, LG+ members, and environmentalists, have all been targeted. It’s not talked about in US history books, but left-wing political members, including but not limited to Communists, were also targeted viciously by Hitler, which seems to be another commonality between the German Nazi regime and Ukrainian ultranationalists.
Now compare the US Mission to the UN’s cold, snide dismissal of Russia’s grave concerns about human rights violations in Ukraine during the UN Security Council meeting with the walkout at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on March 2, 2022 when Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was about to make a speech by video. As described in the previous NSS Essay 9, Lavrov was about to make his speech on human rights—likely about the human rights atrocities committed by the Ukraine government, ultranationalists, and neo-Nazis against Ukrainians, when suddenly the Ukraine Ambassador Yevheniia Filipenko led a walkout on his speech in protest of Russia’s military actions in Donetsk and Lugansk.[17] I get the feeling that we’re supposed to oppose human rights violations only in those situations where we’ve been told to by our political and media authorities or if it’s become the respectable fashion in society—the groupthink fad.
In 2022, after eight years of witnessing a cruel civil war against the people of Donetsk and Lugansk—particularly those of Russian ethnicity, Russia took military action. Russia’s purpose was to protect the people of the self-declared independent nations of Donetsk and Lugansk who’d suffered from eight years of murder, torture, and assault—documented by human rights groups—by Ukraine’s government in Kiev and its associated ultranationalist groups.
Let’s say this loud and clear: Russia would not have felt compelled to take these actions if Ukraine had not been violating international law with impunity.
Why wasn’t Ukraine’s government and its associated paramilitaries condemned for violating the UN Charter and international law in its ruthless, brutal behavior towards the people of Donetsk and Lugansk, particularly Russians, Jews, and Romani, including the burning alive of peaceful protestors in Odessa in May 2014?[18] Why were Putin’s and Russia’s grievances dismissed as “pretexts” for Russian military action rather than recognized as thoroughly valid grievances that, left ignored, would result in Russia’s feeling compelled to resort to military action?
No help from the UN on bio-weapons. Again in 2022, Russia sought help from the UN for a problem—to no avail.
In October 2022, Russia officially proposed to the UN Security Council that the UN create a commission to investigate Russia’s claims of a joint US-Ukrainian military biological program in Ukraine, sponsored by the US Department of Defense, that allegedly exists in violation of the Biological Weapons Convention. Russia submitted a 310-page document of claims.
To me, this sounds like an important and reasonable request. If anyone has reason to believe a bio-weapons program might exist anywhere in the world, the UN ought to investigate and not take chances. Moreover, anyone who’s read “Rebuilding America’s Defenses” (2000) by the neoconservative Project for the New American Century (PNAC), the former “think tank” shamelessly devoted to US hegemony, knows that PNAC was keen on developing bio-weapons that would attack specific genotypes.[19] And, whether it’s the US invasion of Iraq, steady increases in the US military budget, or the development of space forces, what PNAC wants, it seems to get. Even after PNAC became defunct as an official organization, its ideas have continued to powerfully influence US administrations.
Therefore, if Russia is concerned enough to make this proposal and to submit 310 pages of claims, creating a commission to investigate is an excellent idea and a show of caring for Russia’s concerns and for the entire world’s safety. In fact, Russia’s proposal was perfectly in line with the UN Charter Article 1 (1) and Article 1 (3).[20]
But no! While Russia and China supported the proposal, the US, UK, and France, afraid to have the matter even investigated, rejected it. They, tacitly implying that the 310 pages were meaningless, said that Russia had offered no verifiable proof. Never mind that finding proof would be a purpose of the investigation. Never mind that Article 34 does not state that proof of the conclusion of an investigation is required prior to agreeing to launch the investigation.
The other ten members, perhaps too afraid to speak their minds one way or the other, abstained.[21] In the fifteen-member Security Council, nine affirmative votes are required to pass a resolution. Ten abstentions are equivalent in effect to ten rejections. But I’m sure we’ll all rest easier at night knowing that potential bio-weapon labs in Ukraine aren’t being investigated because the USG, who’s never ever lied in its whole life, said that there aren’t any such bio-weapon labs in Ukraine.
In fact, former US and UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter has emphasized the critical importance of rigorous inspections of these labs. He points out that Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “said Russia was able to conclude that ‘components of biological weapons were being developed in Ukraine laboratories in direct proximity to Russian territory.’” Ritter points to Russian claims that the bio-weapon labs include projects on weaponizing bird flu delivered by birds flying from Ukraine to Russia as well as using pathogens for African Swine Fever—sure to wreak havoc on food sources. He remarks that the claims and details discovered about the program “‘suggest that it isn’t done for benevolent purposes, that there is malfeasance attached, which makes it not a defensive program but an offensive program and this is a great concern.’” He adds, “‘I also don’t understand how programs as have been alleged by the Russians could be allowed to exist.’”[22]
The Alliance for Securing “Democracy” (ASD) later listed Russia’s claims regarding bio-weapon programs in Ukraine as “disinformation”—even though no investigation had been allowed to prove or refute the claims. And if the ASD said it’s disinformation, you can be sure it may be truth. The ASD, which appears to be committed to Putin’s downfall, has an advisory board that combines neoconservatives with liberal hawks, including William Kristol, co-founder of the now defunct PNAC of genotype-attacking bio-weapons fame.[23]
ASD is a project of the German Marshall Fund, whose donors in 2019 included ExxonMobil, BP, Raytheon, Boeing, NATO, US Mission to NATO, US Mission to the European Union, Open Society Foundations, Bayer AG, Daimler, SAAB AB, Ministry for Foreign Affairs Sweden, the US Department of State, Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Latvia, the Embassy of the UK in Poland, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Poland, the Embassy of Japan in Washington, DC, Google LLC, Microsoft, Rand Corporation, and JP Morgan Chase & Co.[24] So you’ve got the fossil fuel, weapon, high-tech, automotive, and pharmaceutical industries, some highly biased governments, and NATO itself, amongst others, funding the ASD. And we’re to believe that this funding doesn’t affect ASD’s hiring, procedures, and conclusions, including assertions regarding Russian “disinformation”?
Incidentally, regarding these “think tanks” and their tight connections with the arms industry,[25] a colleague of mine suggests that, rather than labeled “think tank,” with the stress on the first word, the term might be better written as “think TANK” in order to more accurately convey that these are not neutral foreign policy research groups, think tanks, but essentially arms-industry lobbyists, think TANKS, who focus, not on logical, comprehensive, insightful, or effective thinking, but on tanks and other weapons as the panacea for international conflict.
If the USG is so adamant that is has no bio-weapons program, one would think it would be eager to prove that with an impartial commission to investigate. Instead, it seemed to squirm at the very idea of an investigation and hide behind its display of indignation. Labeling something as “disinformation” seems to give it an automatic pass to the dungeon of ideas, not even worthy to be investigated, excommunicated from even consideration at the table of discussion as a possibly valid concept. Ironically, we can recall that it was the USG, with its usual double-standard morality, that was determined to get a UN investigation into Iraq to look for those fictional weapons of mass destruction that it lied to us about.
No help from the UN on Nord Stream explosions. Consider also Russia’s attempts to gain UN support for an impartial international investigation into the Nord Stream pipeline explosions, which according to UN official Navid Hanif, “‘would result in hundreds of thousands of tonnes of methane emissions,’ a gas which has ‘80 times the planet-warming potency of carbon dioxide.’”[26]
In March 2023, one month after the release of the report by legendary investigative reporter Seymour Hersh which accused Sullivan & Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland, and CIA Director William Burns of directing the illegal Nord Stream sabotage,[27] the UN reported that the Security Council failed to adopt the resolution put forward by the Russian Federation’s representative
“which would have established an international independent investigative commission into the September 2022 ‘acts of sabotage’ committed on the Nord Stream gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea.
“By a vote of 3 in favour (Brazil, China, Russian Federation) to none against, with 12 abstentions, the Council rejected the draft resolution, owing to a lack of sufficient votes in favour.”
Unbelievable.
And the USG argument against such an investigative commission? The US ambassador to the UN, Robert A. Wood, alleged that Russia, in proposing such a commission, intended not to seek the truth but to discredit the investigations of Denmark, Germany, and Sweden, “which might not reach conclusions that align with their [Russia’s] predetermined narrative.”
It seems clear that Russia’s intent was to seek the truth. It was not asking for a partial investigation but an international, impartial investigation. It also wanted a more comprehensive investigation. Requests for impartiality and comprehensiveness are made by those seeking truth, not manipulation of the truth.
Russia’s proposal was that the commission would comprise “‘impartial and internationally respected experts’” who would be selected by the Secretary-General.[28] The impartiality of such a commission would contrast greatly, I’d point out, with the obvious one-sidedness of the nationalities of those performing the investigations by Denmark, Sweden, and Germany—all NATO members, all likely to be either partial or vulnerable to pressure, bribes, and threats from the USG and NATO.
If Russia were seeking to manipulate its proposed commission to produce certain results according to a “predetermined narrative,” why would it leave so much power in the hands of the Secretary-General and independent experts? And how could such a commission possibly invalidate the claims or thwart the conclusions of the national investigations when Denmark, Sweden, and Germany have released no results or conclusions whatsoever but have remained clouded behind a thick wall of non-transparency? Even as late as May 2023, Russia issued a complaint regarding the stalled investigation of the Nord Stream explosions of September 2022 and the “‘complete lack of results.’”[29] Such stalling is inexcusable. How hard can it be? Are they that incompetent? Or deliberately stalling? Or waiting to see if they can make a deal with the USG? As time passes, more evidence will be lost.
Even if Russia’s intent were not to seek the truth, how would such an intent have any ability to warp the conclusions of an international investigative commission whose members were experts in their field and were selected by the Secretary-General?
Wood had no proof or evidence of Russia’s intent. I’m quite sure Wood has it backwards: It’s the USG that doesn’t seek the truth and wishes to bury it at the bottom of the Baltic Sea. It’s the USG that doesn’t want to follow through and investigate Seymour Hersh’s report. We all know that Biden and Nuland were insisting that there would be no more Nord Stream if Russia took military action in Donetsk and Lugansk.
Rather than suggesting Russia wants an investigative conclusion that aligns with its “predetermined narrative,” it would be much closer to the truth to say that the USG will not tolerate any conclusions that do not align with its fictional Cultural Script, in which Putin’s alleged malice and mendaciousness continually menace the world, and saintly Sullivan & Biden would never ever dream of blowing up pipelines.
So at the UN Security Council, 3 voted in favour of Russia’s proposal, 0 voted against it, and 12 abstained. When you need 9 votes in favor to pass a proposal, 12 abstentions amount to 12 rejections: they doom the proposal.
So why all the abstentions? Why did the UN delegations from twelve nations so gullibly trust that investigators from Denmark, Sweden, and Germany—three NATO nations over-eager to please the USG in the midst of a NATO proxy war against Russia—would not feel intimidated or bribed by their own governments, the USG, or NATO to keep their mouths shut about the results of their investigations? If anything smacks of an investigation not seeking truth it’s this group, not Russia’s proposed commission. Had the twelve nations’ delegations been intimidated or bribed?
What’s extraordinarily odd about the UN’s decision is also the fact that the Nord Stream pipelines are primarily Russian property. Wouldn’t this suggest that Russia absolutely has a right to play a direct role in the investigation and Russia is definitely on legitimate ground in asking the UN for an impartial international investigation?
How dare NATO members at the UN initiate investigations that deliberately exclude Russia! How dare they turn down Russia’s request at the UN! But we’ll have to remember this the next time NYC gets bombed: the USG won’t be allowed to investigate its own property; we’ll leave that to China, Iran, Russia, and North Korea.
Manipulation of the UN violates the UN Charter. With lack of UN support for Russia’s concerns and proposals about ultranationalist/neo-Nazi violence in eastern Ukraine, about bio-weapon labs in Ukraine, and about the Nord Stream explosions, with the UN giving a shy little slap on the wrist to the USG for massively invading Iraq in 2003 and directly killing hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, we have to ask: is the UN loyal to its own charter or is it loyal to SOMEBODY else?
Keep in mind a point made in the earlier NSS Essay Part 4: According to Njoki Njoroge Njehu, director of the 50 Years is Enough campaign, because the war against Iraq was of strategic interest to the United States, “several African members of the UN Security Council, including Cameroon, Guinea and Angola, were virtually held to ransom when the United States was seeking council support for the war in 2003.”[30]
This is just great. So we have the USG reportedly bribing and threatening other nations in the Security Council to vote the way the USG wants. How can this possibly serve the purpose of cooperative, peaceful problem-solving—the UN’s mandate?
From where did Njehu gather this information? What evidence is there to support the claim that the USG was using bribes and threats against these African nations? Well, I found an article in the Guardian online from back in 2003, back when such articles were not yet censored right out of the media: “Revealed: US dirty tricks to win vote in Iraq war,” which states:
“The United States is conducting a secret ‘dirty tricks’ campaign against UN Security Council delegations in New York as part of its battle to win votes in favour of war against Iraq.
“Details of the aggressive surveillance operation, which involves interception of the home and office telephones and the emails of UN delegates in New York, are revealed in a document leaked to The Observer.
“The disclosures were made in a memorandum written by a top official at the National Security Agency.”
The surveillance operation is “understood to have been requested by President Bush’s National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice.” The memo itself was sent by Frank Koza of the NSA.
Tying in closely with Njehu’s remarks, the memo includes orders to staff to especially target Security Council members
“to provide up-to-the-minute intelligence for Bush officials on the voting intentions of UN members regarding the issue of Iraq.
“The leaked memorandum makes clear that the target of the heightened surveillance efforts are the delegations from Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Mexico, Guinea and Pakistan at the UN headquarters in New York.”
The memo further explained that the NSA
“is ‘mounting a surge’ aimed at gleaning information not only on how delegations on the Security Council will vote on any second resolution on Iraq, but also ‘policies’, ‘negotiating positions’, ‘alliances’ and ‘dependencies’—the ‘whole gamut of information that could give US policymakers an edge in obtaining results favorable to US goals or to head off surprises.’”
Disclosures of the leaked memo
“come amid increasingly threatening noises from the US towards undecided countries on the Security Council who have been warned of the unpleasant economic consequences of standing up to the US.”
The article concludes:
“The disclosure comes at a time when diplomats from the countries have been complaining about the outright ‘hostility’ of US tactics in recent days to persuade them to fall in line, including threats to economic aid packages.”[31]
In other words, Security Council members aren’t supposed to think about Just War principles, about the UN Charter, about the pros and cons of war against Iraq, the validity of USG information, or the opinions of their own people. For all its constant blabber about wanting to help people in other nations make their own decisions and decide their own future, the USG wants other nations’ leaders to make their decisions based upon what the USG tells them to do.
Of course, the ability of the USG to threaten these nations financially only points to the fact that the UN must do a better job of fulfilling one purpose set forth in its preamble: “to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples.” Nations must be able to receive grants and loans without dependence upon USG approval. Nations must be able to say “no” to the Iraq War and “no” to helping out in the Persian Gulf War without fear of significant economic repercussions from the USG or from an international lending agency. Furthermore, trade conditions should be corrected so that such aid is much less necessary. In fact, 50 Years Is Enough is a coalition of 200 organizations dedicated to the profound transformation of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Apparently, wheeling and dealing is the way Security Council votes are secured. Other articles from 2003 describe how both the USG, who wants an invasion of Iraq (and wants Iraq oil contracts), and France, who doesn’t want an invasion (and who already has Iraq oil contracts), are both lobbying Angola.
“Never before has Angola felt so wanted.
“The southern Africa nation has been besieged by American and French suitors seeking its support on Iraq.”
While the lobbyists insist they’re not using money as a lure, they’re using lures of trade benefits, help on commercial projects, and possible invitations to the White House (if that’s actually a lure or not, I don’t know). ExxonMobil’s interest in Angola’s oil deposits are also mentioned in the article as possibly tangled in with the bargaining for votes as well as the fact that the US is “Angola’s biggest trading partner and largest single aid donor.”[32]
All of this means that the Security Council stands for nothing more than selfishness and greed because at least some if not many of its votes are gained by appeals to the selfish desires of the governments of those nations. Determining whether to support or oppose the invasion of Iraq is about supporting either US or French oil interests in Iraq and getting what you can out of the USG or France to buy your vote. To hell with the millions of Iraqis who will suffer. That’s irrelevant. Right?
But what’s the purpose of such a vote? It’s better off not having the Security Council or the General Assembly if their votes are based on selfishness and greed rather than principles of ethics, humanity, and justice.
Can we have an impartial investigation on the bribes and threats that transpire in the UN? And don’t wait for a resolution on the matter because the USG will veto it. What percentage of votes are gained through appeals to selfishness and greed? What percentage of votes are gained solely through appeals to principles of morality, humanity, and justice, and values of non-violent conflict resolution?
According to Article 1 (4), the UN is
“To be a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends.”
Article 2 (1) states: “The Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members.”[33]
Using bribes and threats is not the type of “harmonizing” intended by the charter. Moreover, if nations must rely upon USG approval for US aid or for IMF and World Bank loans, then the “sovereign equality” mandated by Article 2 (1) has been violated, for some members are now more powerful than others in their relations within the UN’s Security Council. Their wealth brings them greater power to bribe. Such violations of Article 2 (1) should be prosecuted.
Conclusion. Russia was trying for eight years to resolve Ukraine’s civil war non-violently. Yes, it was reportedly also sending weapons, and whether or not this escalated the conflict can be investigated, but my impression is that Russia was especially trying to resolve the conflict non-violently by means of the Minsk Agreements. And remember, Ukraine was attacking Donetsk and Lugansk, not the other way around. Donetsk and Lugansk were on defense. Meanwhile the USG’s solution toolbox for the crisis was apparently filled only with weapons. The USG was shipping weapons over those eight years to violently get its way in Ukraine, and, to my awareness, the USG and UN were doing nothing to try to resolve the conflict peacefully.
So just who was giving Russia a helping hand in its non-violent efforts? Anybody? In what way did anyone at all genuinely try to resolve the problem so that Russia would not feel compelled, after eight years, to involve its military?
It’s useful to discuss what other effective options Russia may have had, but it’s critically important to turn the discussion to what other options the USG, Ukrainian government, US and Western media, and the UN should have taken—cooperatively with Russia, Donetsk, and Lugansk, not against them—to prevent this conflict to begin with and to keep it from escalating.
If these governments and organizations are too mired in corruption, greed, and bribery to change, if they are too steeped in prejudice to believe one word that Russia says, are there other impartial international organizations to which Russia could call upon when it needs help stopping and preventing human rights violations, impartially investigating bio-weapon labs and pipeline explosions, and striving for successful non-violent conflict resolution? Are there respected organizations and individuals who could provide Russia with support, impartial media coverage, and the respect and trust gained from impartial, international observers and facilitators?
If the UN is not faithful to its own charter but bows instead to dynamics of intimidation and bribery, we must find or create other avenues to support “peace by peaceful means.”
Kristin Christman has been independently researching US foreign policy and peace since 9/11. Her channel focuses on US-Russian relations at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuNEw9-10lk-CwU-5vAElcg. Kristin graduated summa cum laude from Dartmouth College with a BA in Russian, and she holds Master’s degrees in Slavic languages from Brown University and public administration from SUNY Albany. She has been a guest with former UNSCOM weapons inspector Scott Ritter and UNAC coordinator Joe Lombardo on Cynthia Pooler’s program, Issues that Matter, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDlaLNJih7U. Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice recently published her article on suicide, culture, and peace in their special edition on suicide, Vol. 33 No. 4. [email protected]
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