Friday, March 6, 2009

UK: CHINA! IT'S CHINA'S FAULT! CHINAAAAA!!!

UK Ambassador John Sawers just announced that the Security Council is not able to issue a press statement urging Sudan to let back in the 13 aid NGOs it booted out of the country following the ICC indictment of President Bashir. Press statements by the Council require unanimity of all its members. According to Sawers, "one member" wanted to put in an extraneous reference to the ICC indictment into the text. Sawers further clarified that this was one of the five permanent members, and that it was not the UK, France, US, or Russia.

Perhaps you can narrow it down from there.

Update: Ambassador Abdulmahmood Abdalhaleem Muhamad of Sudan dismissed the Council even meeting about the "so-called humanitarian situation in Sudan," and said the "irresponsible NGOs" that Sudan had booted from the country "were polluting the atmosphere unnecessarily against the Sudan government and leadership" and "messing up everything in terms of the stability and security in the respective states of Darfur." He dismissed the importance of the NGOs. "Definitely there is a storm in a teacup," he added. "It is propaganda. It is publicity."

Update 2: When reporters asked to see the dossier of evidence against the NGOs, Amb. Muhamad said he could bring it with him. When reporters asked him to bring it to the Security Council press stakeout on monday, Amb. Muhamad said "no it is better you should come to my office and see the whole dossier." After Bill Varner from Bloomberg offered to do this, Amb. Muhamad said "No, because if you saw it you might have a heart attack. It is very strong evidence."

Yikes.

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