The countries of the world are at the United Nations HQ in New York all this month trying to hammer out an Arms Trade Treaty. As Kristy Kirkup reports, Iran had been elected one of the vice-presidents to assist in the treaty formation.
Think this is weird?
Ted Bromund from Heritage Foundation has been following the events, here’s part of his roundup of the bizarre first week.
The totalitarian states are deviously brilliant. Their representatives have been around for years, so they know everyone, and they know the drill. They waste time expertly and are not at all shy about raising points of order and asking the same question over and over again. Their favorite tactic is to imply that everyone else is acting in bad faith, which works only if others have what they lack: a conscience. They are completely unabashed about making declarations of principle (such as Cuba’s demand for “objective criteria” in the treaty, which really means criteria that will never be used against Cuba) that are even more self-interested than most diplomacy. They don’t much like the glare of publicity, but it doesn’t really put them off. They either coordinate with each other or sing from the same song sheet instinctively. And they are shameless about playing to the many small states in the room.
Time for Canada to drop this treaty and the UN.
