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Roger Iredale:  the Friend, 21 October 2011

I have never had any difficulty with remembering United Nations Day, 24 October, since it coincides with my mother’s birthday! This huge organisation rambles like a rose bush over the globe, with its many offshoots involved in almost every aspect of human life in every corner of the world.

Some, like UNICEF, do outstanding work with children and mothers in slums and deserts, while others come to the aid of the beleaguered Gazans, or struggle to keep peace in the vast recesses of Central Africa. Friends have been able to make their influence felt through our offices in Geneva and New York.

The organisation was born of the idealism of the eccentric pacifist Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson and his Bloomsbury circle, who began to create the League of Nations even before the First World War ended. While that organisation failed to prevent the next war, it created many agencies later inherited by the UN and provided a template for the present structure of seventeen elements, including UNESCO, the International Monetary Fund and the International Atomic Energy Agency.

It is a pacifist concept born of a profound objection to war as a means of resolving disputes. That it is empowered to sanction military action in response to emergencies is a constant source of tension and contradiction.

A political organisation with an intergovernmental dimension, the UN inevitably attracts the power struggles and egotism that characterise politics. I have talked with a chief statistician whose job was threatened because of her unwillingness to distort the sensitive literacy statistics of an influential member state. I have unknowingly worked with an official who was secretly employed to follow the Cold War rivalries within one of the agencies. And I have seen the scrawled, defiant file notes of an autocratic director-general, written in pursuit of some private agenda, countermanding the considered judgments of a senior colleague.

In such a vast enterprise, aberrations are inevitable.The UN represents governments, and governments come in all shapes and sizes. Some agencies are more effective than others. All aim to help the poorest and most vulnerable.

The General Assembly and the Security Council are central to the UN. The latter is an absurd historical anomaly, with France and Britain occupying permanent seats – while India and Brazil have to take their turn with the rest of the world.

Does this jealously guarded status quo contribute to the belief of the British political classes that they have a right to fight other people’s wars? Did Tony Blair’s military adventures arise from Britain’s self-importance because it sits beside China, the USA and the Russian Federation at the top table? Is it fair that this small island can wield such influence over global decision making? Indeed, is it right that any country, particularly the USA after it misled the General Assembly on Iraq, can veto crucially important world events? Everyone agrees that there is a need for change, but then the Tower of Babel takes over.

So, we have this valued, ubiquitous entity embracing the globe and trying to spread flowers of peace in dangerous places, tackling poverty, refugees, health, agricultural, economic, cultural, scientific, financial and social issues.

Though it works from a script that was written some sixty years ago, in a very different world, it was conceived by people of peace and it remains the only sane barrier to the opposite.

Roger Iredale is a member of Mid-Somerset Area Meeting.  His work has involved close collaboration with UN agencies across the globe. He is emeritus professor of international education at the University of Manchester and former chief education adviser to the Minister for Overseas Development.

Palestine applies for UNESCO membership

The Inter Press Service reports that the 193-member General Conference, UNESCO’s policy-making body, is expected to ratify Palestine’s membership during the session beginning Oct. 25. The application was approved by the agency’s 58-member executive board earlier in the week. 

However the administration of President Barack Obama, under lobbying pressure from Israel and pro-Israeli members of Congress and senators, is threatening to cut off funds to the U.N. agency if it recognises the political legitimacy of Palestine. 

On October 6^th, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States may cut off funding to UNESCO if it moves forward on its recommendation to admit the Palestinian Authority as a full member. The U.N. culture and science agency stands to lose $87 million a year, or 22 percent of the total budget, without U.S. funding. 

Palestinian membership of the International Criminal Court could lead to restrictions on the movements of Israeli leaders 

Israel has accused the Palestinians of trying to “politicise Unesco”. It fears that recognition by affiliate UN bodies could lead to Palestinian membership of the International Criminal Court. If Palestinians were to lodge cases there against Israel, it could restrict the movements of Israeli leaders, at a time when even Washington has warned the Jewish state about its increasingly diplomatic isolation. 

Israeli officials expressed concern that Palestinian membership of Unesco, which recognises historically or culturally important places as World Heritage Sites, could be used to drag disputes over the cultural ownership of disputed holy sites in the region into the international arena. 

The question of historical sites is particularly sensitive in the area, since many of them are sacred to Jews, Muslims and Christians and have at times served as mosques, churches or synagogues. 

Yesterday, President Abbas flew to Strasbourg and asked Europe for its backing: “You supported the Arab Spring which was seeking democracy and freedom,” he said. “Now the Palestinian Spring has arrived, asking for freedom and an end to the occupation.  We deserve your support.”

The Luxemburger Wort adds that vote has not been scheduled, but will take place at UNESCO’s General Conference, which runs from Oct. 25 to Nov. 10. 

The Palestinians are also seeking a foothold in the World Trade Organization and won partnership status recently in the Council of Europe, the continent’s leading human rights body.

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                  Guest Speaker  Heather Blake:  

UK chair of Reporters without Borders

Elizabeth Way summarises this Birmingham UNA meeting, held on September 17^th: 

On the 17th of September Heather Blake UK Director of Reporters Without Borders (RWB) spoke to the Birmingham Branch AGM about Press Freedom and Human Rights. 

 RWB was founded in 1985 to support journalists and uphold their rights and to report freely. It helps financially by supporting the families of journalists imprisoned or murdered. She spoke about the increased deliberate attacks on journalists and the increasing violation of human rights.  I pressed for the establishment of laws to facilitate free reporting and for the UN to get the right to report firmly established as one of UN human rights. 

RWB will send one of their panel of experts to areas that have been reported to look at the evidence.  They can send protest letters to governments responsible.  They can then work to raise the international profile of events in that country.

Heather Blake spoke of the problems arising from the cutting of financial support for the World Service by the BBC; it may be impossible for some countries to hear a more truthful alternative to the state media, making human rights violations more probable.  She praised the balanced reporting of Al-Jazeera.  She also spoke about the need to balance detailed reporting in some situations in order to safeguard people who are opposing their own government and giving vital information to the reporter.  Heather praised the Birmingham branch for their informed interest and searching questions.

UNA-UK London and South-East Region – Autumn Council Meeting, 17^th September 2011Discussion on the Arab Spring

Led by

Roger Hardy: Middle East and Islamic Affairs analyst with BBC World Service for over 20 years;

Author of The Muslim Revolt: a Journey through Political Islam available from Amazon;

Currently a Visiting Fellow at the LSE

And

Dr Firas Jabloun: Board Member of the Council for Anglo-Arab Understanding;

London representative of the Progressive Democratic Party of Tunisia;

Particular interests in Tunisia and Palestine

Roger Hardy was in Washington DC when the Arab Spring took off, totally unpredicted by him or anyone else.  The slogans in Egypt were both political and witty: “Bread and Dignity”; “Hurry up, Hosni!  I want to get home to my wife!”

The causes of the risings were broadly similar; the dynamics and outcomes are different in each place.  The Bread, Jobs and Dignity Deficit was universal and resulted in a sudden outburst of frustration which had been building up for decades.  In a region where 70% of the population are under 30, the first demonstrators were predominantly the Young and “wired up”; tweeting, twittering and using their mobile phones.  They were the catalyst but became a minority as others joined in.  Another common feature was Autocracy: family elites ruling without respect for the Human Rights of the common people.  Corruption was universal too; a self-perpetuating system which people finally resolved not to tolerate any more.

Roger Hardy sees the Arab lands in three categories. First, the Trail-blazers, where three regimes have been overthrown: Tunisia, Egypt and (as yet an incomplete transition) Libya. Second, the Brutally Repressed: bloodshed and oppression in Bahrain and Syria.  Third, the Rest: more-or-less stable situations with no serious uprisings, like Saudi Arabia. 

He thinks the Syrian regime is bound to survive despite the amazing courage of the demonstrators. The only thing that could overthrow them would be  a decision of military and security forces to change sides and this is most unlikely.  It is extremely difficult to know what is happening in that country.  Western politicians are rhetorically critical but there is no possibility of the sort of military intervention which turned the tide in Libya.  That intervention caused such heartache, grief and lack of consensus it is not likely to be a popular precedent for others.

Roger Hardy is sure the notion of Arab exceptionalism – that the Arabs will never enjoy freedom and prosperity – has gone forever. Our ideals and principles lead us to welcome and support the uprisings  – why should the Arabs continue to suffer under corrupt autocrats?  But our politicians are faced with difficult decisions as they react to the unforeseen events.  Of course, they want to be seen on the right side of history – but should that include supporting the overthrow of elites which have served our interests?   Does principle now trump interests?  Roger Hardy thinks the rhetoric of Obama and others has been “spinning into hyperbole”.

In practice, America’s “Freedom Agenda” has been quietly dropped.  Western leaders must recognise that our ability to help the Arab Spring, politically or economically, is in fact very limited.  Millions of Arabs want to believe that the West is “a man on a white horse” coming to rescue them but that is not going to happen.  The regime in Bahrain was challenged with nothing but words and words had no influence on them - or on Saudi Arabia, which has made Bahrain a kind of protectorate.  We need a coherent and believable approach to events in the Middle East and have not got there yet.

Firas Jabloun: the catalyst for the rising in Tunisia was a young man, Mohamed Bouazizi, prevented by a police-woman from selling his vegetables illegally in the street, setting himself on fire.  That was on the 17^th of December 2010, and the role of Social Media in what followed was crucial: huge demonstrations, one in front of the state capitol in Tunis, led to the departure of President Ben Ali on the 14^th of January 2011.  

As elsewhere, the uprising was led by young people who felt they had nothing to lose: no jobs, no prospects.    Years of bad development policies had produced a large economic and social gap between the people of the interior and those of coastal regions and it was the people of the interior who supported the first protestors. 

The Tunisian economy, above all the tourist industry, was badly hit by the financial crisis of 2008 and Europe’s long-delayed recovery.  The global economic crisis created the conditions for the mass uprising sparked by the death of the street trader but the roots of it all were much deeper, in years of corruption, injustice and growing frustration.  Firas Jabloun thinks Tunisia experienced a revolution for Dignity even more than for Bread – the motivation was more political than economic.

The wealth of the elite families in Tunisia is equal to a third of the national debt.  Resentment grew across the population with speculation that Ben Ali intended to further extend his term of office, or to install his son or his wife in his place.  The demonstrators came from all social classes, with placards reading “Yes to bread and water, No to Ben Ali”: they were prepared to suffer to be rid of him. 

A counter-revolution is still under way in Tunisia and the people have had to show great discipline and maturity in a period of chaos.  Elections for a new Constituent Assembly are scheduled for the 23^rd of October 2011.  Firas Jabloun hopes these will prepare the ground for better times.  We should not exaggerate the importance of extremists from either political pole – the conservative Islamists or the progressive (and secular) Modernists.  The road to democracy in Tunisia is still bumpy, but he is optimistic that the moderates from both sides will prevail. 

Question Time1.      Brian – Obama is losing popularity on the Arab street as the Turkish Prime Minister, Erdogan, is gaining it.  Why can’t Obama influence Israel’s Netanyahu to make meaningful compromises with the Palestinians?  What do the speakers think will be the attitude of the Arab street to the US?  RH wishes he could be more optimistic. It is an illusion to think that social-networking youth don’t think about political Islam anymore; or about American policy toward Israel.  The issues are all linked in the minds on the Arab street.  Western governments backed the dictators and don’t help the Arabs deal with Israel.  “At a certain point, talk of a Peace Process becomes indecent.”    FJ said Obama has never been popular in Arab countries – “the Arabs hate the United States; that is a fact.”  Any initial hope they may have had in Obama has gone.  Freedom for Palestine is the ultimate target of the Arab Uprising. 2.      Gurbakhsh – Do they agree that the economic interests of the West will prevail, and will not be endangered by the Arab Spring?  FJ thinks the West are playing catch-up, trying to protect their interests.  RH said that in the inevitable tension between principles and interests, politicians naturally try to have it both ways.  Clegg recently said the Arab Spring is very important and that it’s in our interests to support it.  “Up to a point, Mr Deputy Prime Minister.”  But rhetoric outstrips reality: Oil – Arms – Support for Israel – Suspicion of Iran – those issues are there now and will still be there in five years’ time, he is sure. 

3.      Joyce – What is the impact of political Islam on the new constitutions; especially regarding the role of women?  FJ In Muslim countries, political Islam dominates the conservative wing with a mix of radical and moderate opinion.  There is a huge debate going on about what constitutes Moslem and Arab identity.  The role of women and heritage are part of that debate.  Tunisia has a long history of giving women rights and they now enjoy equal rights.  He’s sure the tradition there is so firmly established that no opposition could change it.  It is a legal requirement that the lists for the forthcoming elections offer equal numbers of men and women as candidates, a ruling accepted by the Islamists.  Indeed, a woman heads the list of one group.  RH recently wrote a book about this, only slightly outdated by the Arab Spring.  The Islamists can read the tealeaves – they know that if they don’t get this right, they’ll blow their best opportunity for decades.  Young women have played a very significant role in the risings, and it would be very hard to get that genie back into the bottle. 4.      David  W – had read in full William Hague’s address at the Foreign Office (8 September) with its analysis of how bankrupt UK foreign policy has been in the last 10 years; quite shameful to us in part.  David asked the speakers to comment on a recent experience of his – organising a cultural exhibition and festival at a historic library in Alexandria, he found that the media people in Cairo weren’t in the least interested in it.  The organisers had to pay Cairo reporters to cover it.  Cairo is only interested in Cairo; and the media – BBC, Al Jazeera and the rest, only listen to their colleagues in Cairo. There is nothing about the regions in the Egyptian press; he reads it every day.   RH agreed: yes, the media are capital-centred; yes, in Iraq they sat safely in the Green Zone.  If we want broader coverage in overseas countries, we should write to our MPs to complain about the cuts to the BBC World Service.  In the Egyptian Arab Spring, the media focused on Tahrir Square and the heroic young people, some of whom died; others with scars on their backs.  But they were only part of the story and, RH argues, they were not “representative”.  FJ said no one “owns reality”.  There is a lot of dust in the Arab world now, there are many mixed messages coming from all over the place, nothing is clear.  He recently spent two weeks in Tunisia and found that people he spoke to gave a totally different picture of events from those on Facebook.   

5.      Mohammed – thinks Americans did and do have an important influence in the Middle East, for example on the Egyptian army.  Without American influence, the revolution in Egypt would have been much bloodier, and the intervention in Libya would not have happened at all.  Granted, not everything has been positive.  Were the lessons of Iraq really learnt?  Should we have pushed harder for a negotiated settlement in Libya or was the mission creep that has happened inevitable?  Roger Hallam – UNA-UK has had serious debate on the role of the Western Powers, including a resolution at the June 2011 conference.  External intervention should be based on the widest possible consensus at the UN and especially the relevant Region.  There was implicit criticism of what did happen.  But whether the NATO action led by Britain and France breached SC resolution 1973 was not debated.  Joyce – UN support for the R2P was welcome but it raises serious questions, and it need not always involve military action.  FJ said the West were totally out of the picture in Tunisia.  Ben Ali’s “escape” from the country surprised everyone.  But the West had been a factor in Egypt and Libya.  He doesn’t think purely peaceful demonstrations ever topple dictators, they are brutal.  The political situation in Tunisia made a change of regime possible – there was only weak support for it and strong opposition.  As for a negotiated settlement in Libya, “Gaddafi is a crazy person; you couldn’t negotiate with him.”  RH we need to recognise the limits of our influence.  Mohammed had mentioned the two exceptions to the general rule: (a) the Egyptian army – RH is more worried about the role of the army in Egypt than that of the Muslim Brotherhood.  They will be very tricky to handle.  When he was in Washington in January-February, the phones sizzled with American top brass speaking to their Egyptian counterparts.  Two messages were given: do not fire on the people; Mubarak must go.  It might have happened anyway – but Obama played that card; the only card he could play.  (b) The West’s intervention in Libya was and will remain exceptional in his view.  The drawbacks to military intervention are obvious. Sanctions are broken or by-passed.  Humanitarian intervention sounds simple but every case is different and hugely problematic.  6.      Mohammed – argued that not all Islamists are politically conservative and thinks that factional interests are what influence vital policies relating to oil companies, for example, and jobs.  There’s a spectrum of things.  FJ reaffirmed his view that political Islam is conservative, but conservative in different ways.  Their approach to political and economic matters varies; and both sides have their moderates and radicals.  For Tunisia, he hopes that the moderates of both sides will lead the country from the centre.  Politics is always about interests.  He’d welcome help from the West, but not interference.  Above all, he hopes that development happens from within Tunisia and so attracts positive interest from the West.  RH said people including politicians sometimes act contrary to their rational interests, e.g. the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and our “collective over-reaction to 9-11”.  Sometimes the fact an action is contrary to interests is only apparent in hindsight.  William Hague said again and again that we’re only acting in Libya to protect civilians in accordance with Resolution 1973 – then adds Gaddafi must go.  “It doesn’t square, mate.  It’s humbug.”  Humanitarian Intervention is really tricky. It’s worth remembering what Lord Caradon said years ago: there’s nothing wrong with the United Nations except its members.  What they do brings discredit to the Organisation. 

7.      David - The Assad government in Syria is defending a secular state against an Islamist opposition, and they are the main bulwark against Israel acting against Palestinians with complete impunity.  FJ does not agree that the survival of the Assad regime would be in any way helpful to the Palestinians; on the contrary.  The best and only effective opposition to Israel would be genuine democracy in Arab lands, reflecting the views of the people.  He hopes that Tunisia can demonstrate a success story – achieving consensus despite difficulties.  That could be an example for Syria to follow.  RH thinks the Assad regime is sure to survive because the military and security forces are united behind it: they will “sink or swim with the Assad clan.”  There’s no doubt that most people are fed up with the regime: the father of the present leader was even more utterly ruthless than the son (e.g. Hama atrocity, February 1982).  8.      Karl – Which countries should, could or are the people of the Arab Spring looking to as Role Models for inspiration?  Are the elites all intact?  What policies have been put forward to give Bread and Dignity?”FJ thinks Tunisia offers the best example for inspiration.  There has been no major change in Egypt, the military were and are still in control.  There has been no military intervention in politics in Tunisia. Bread and Dignity come with democracy, and that takes time. Members of the former elite are still around; it would be dangerous to get rid of them all at once.  A gradual dismantling of the old regime keeps things stable.  RH agrees that Tunisia is a good model and Egypt to a degree.  The people of Syria are an inspiration too, with their extraordinary courage.  Turkey too is an interesting role model; more so than Iran.  Yes, the ruling elites remain intact though in disguise.  There are no serious policies yet for Bread and Dignity and there is a deep distrust of the West.  Because of that, Egypt turned down the offer of a World Bank loan – but that won’t last.  Countries need popularly elected governments with a strong mandate to effect change. 9.      Wendy – Is the NATO intervention in Benghazi/Libya a good example of the R2P in action?  RH said that by NATO standards, getting SC Resolution 1973 and acting on it was astonishingly fast, though it was just in the nick of time.  Thereafter it was pragmatic: during periods of stalemate it was “let’s talk to Gaddafi”; if it seemed the rebels could win, “Gaddafi must go.”    

10.  Peter – Civil Society movements were very important in the peaceful democratisation of Eastern Europe and the fall of the Berlin Wall.  They don’t seem to be as effective in the Middle East.  What could we do?  FJ Civil Society Organisations have existed in Tunisia for a long time. They were harassed by the Ben Ali regime but are more active now.  RH the deep distrust of the West in Arab minds comes from a strong folk memory of the colonial period and living memory of our governments’ support for their dictators.  But it doesn’t apply to us as individuals.  We can all do something to help at some level; for example, have a cheap holiday in Tunisia or Libya. Roger Hallam concluded the discussion, recalling that the role of the Third Sector/ Civil Society is as important now as at the time of decolonisation, though we seem to have lost a lot of the resonance of that period.  We were taken by surprise by the Arab Spring and have no links with partners in the Arab world.  If we want to see development and positive change in the region, we should try to make such connections.