The Malta Independent
At last we had something positive from Iraq. Finally it seems that the US has been forced to accept that it cannot go it alone and allowed the UN to perform its role as a peace broker among the various factions that are pretending to have a say in the process to restore sovereignty through democratisation in a state that seemed set to implode into civil war.
Finally it seems we are to have a UN resolution which endorses the transition of sovereignty to an interim representative government selected with the assistance of the UN special envoy for Iraq Laqta Brahimi, until this interim administration organises formal and internationally supervised general elections early next year.
It would appear that finally the US has had to accept to address the ambivalence of its position of wishing to restore full sovereignty to Iraq whilst at the same time keeping forces inside Iraq without a covering UN resolution and without being invited by a sovereign government. Though it seems that the final UN resolution is short of giving an outright veto to the interim Iraqi government on the permanence of the US coalition troops in Iraq, it provides for substantial consultation with the government before use of any force.
The civilised world now hopes that the US coalition will provide the necessary cover of security to ensure that free and fair elections are held to produce a sovereign democratic government for Iraq that can truly start taking direct responsibility for the country`s own security with assistance as may be requested through a UN peacekeeping force.
Hopefully the interim representative government, will succeed to gain the trust of the various factions, sufficiently to bring their conflicting expectations to the round-table conference which will be called to stimulate international assistance for the reconstruction of Iraq permitting the country to use its vast natural resources for its own development.
One week`s good news remains a fragile base for confidence that the process will continue without too much obstructions from terror factions that plan to impose their fundamentalism rather than allow the democratic development desired by the majority.
However one sees far more prospects of success now that the UN has been restored to play a central part in the process to democratic elections, reducing the perception that all was a mise-en-scene by the US to install a puppet government to serve its (US) political and economic interests.
President Bush has reluctantly had to accept that the price of unilateralism could be as high as risking the status of the US as the sole super-power.` He has paid a high price in adopting blindly Pentagon`s simplistic theory that America had a right to attack other countries in pre-emption without going through the process of gaining UN approval for any belligerence which was considered necessary to protect national interest.
Through this learning process President Bush has had to learn that whilst cultural and language ties with UK could help to take their toeing the US policy line almost for granted (though it is doubtful whether any future UK Prime Minister will be as accommodating to US policy as Tony Blair has been in the Iraq saga, paying in the process great expense in terms personal popularity), the French are much more independent minded. They hold the key to the support of other UN security council members Russia and China who probably could not economically afford to adopt the leading role in opposing the US resolution for UN cover for its premature attack on Iraq.
With hindsight it is clear that France played a very useful role in cutting America to size and forcing it to realise that Super-power status does not provide a licence to side-step multilateral checks and balances before a country attacks any other, irrespective of size or economic status.
These positive developments in no way mean that the war on terror has been won. It means however, that contrary to what has been happening when the US imposed unilateral aggression, the people of imploding countries no longer feel the natural attraction to fight perceived US arrogance by condoning or supporting terrorism. It means such people are given a realistic hope to achieve their sovereign aspirations through a democratic process supervised by the UN.
The war on terror has to continue as the minority who want to return to 14th century caliphate style Muslim states, will do everything to break the UN sponsored process to democratic sovereignty. But the war on terror is unlikely to be won by guns alone. It is best addressed by taking genuine initiatives to restart the Palestine peace plan leading to sovereign formation of a Palestinian state that can live in peace with Israel and benefit from the economic power that Israeli technology can spread to the region if political obstacles can be overcome.
The UN success in Iraq should provide stimulus for the resumption of UN sponsored peace talks between Israel and Palestine where the US is engaged to bring pressure for concessions on Israel and the EU to do likewise on the Palestinians.
At last we had something positive from Iraq. Finally it seems that the US has been forced to accept that it cannot go it alone and allowed the UN to perform its role as a peace broker among the various factions that are pretending to have a say in the process to restore sovereignty through democratisation in a state that seemed set to implode into civil war. Finally it seems we are to have a UN resolution which endorses the transition of sovereignty to an interim representative government selected with the assistance of the UN special envoy for Iraq Laqta Brahimi, until this interim administration organises formal and internationally supervised general elections early next year.
It would appear that finally the US has had to accept to address the ambivalence of its position of wishing to restore full sovereignty to Iraq whilst at the same time keeping forces inside Iraq without a covering UN resolution and without being invited by a sovereign government. Though it seems that the final UN resolution is short of giving an outright veto to the interim Iraqi government on the permanence of the US coalition troops in Iraq, it provides for substantial consultation with the government before use of any force.
The civilised world now hopes that the US coalition will provide the necessary cover of security to ensure that free and fair elections are held to produce a sovereign democratic government for Iraq that can truly start taking direct responsibility for the country`s own security with assistance as may be requested through a UN peacekeeping force.
Hopefully the interim representative government, will succeed to gain the trust of the various factions, sufficiently to bring their conflicting expectations to the round-table conference which will be called to stimulate international assistance for the reconstruction of Iraq permitting the country to use its vast natural resources for its own development.
One week`s good news remains a fragile base for confidence that the process will continue without too much obstructions from terror factions that plan to impose their fundamentalism rather than allow the democratic development desired by the majority.
However one sees far more prospects of success now that the UN has been restored to play a central part in the process to democratic elections, reducing the perception that all was a mise-en-scene by the US to install a puppet government to serve its (US) political and economic interests.
President Bush has reluctantly had to accept that the price of unilateralism could be as high as risking the status of the US as the sole super-power.` He has paid a high price in adopting blindly Pentagon`s simplistic theory that America had a right to attack other countries in pre-emption without going through the process of gaining UN approval for any belligerence which was considered necessary to protect national interest.
Through this learning process President Bush has had to learn that whilst cultural and language ties with UK could help to take their toeing the US policy line almost for granted (though it is doubtful whether any future UK Prime Minister will be as accommodating to US policy as Tony Blair has been in the Iraq saga, paying in the process great expense in terms personal popularity), the French are much more independent minded. They hold the key to the support of other UN security council members Russia and China who probably could not economically afford to adopt the leading role in opposing the US resolution for UN cover for its premature attack on Iraq.
With hindsight it is clear that France played a very useful role in cutting America to size and forcing it to realise that Super-power status does not provide a licence to side-step multilateral checks and balances before a country attacks any other, irrespective of size or economic status.
These positive developments in no way mean that the war on terror has been won. It means however, that contrary to what has been happening when the US imposed unilateral aggression, the people of imploding countries no longer feel the natural attraction to fight perceived US arrogance by condoning or supporting terrorism. It means such people are given a realistic hope to achieve their sovereign aspirations through a democratic process supervised by the UN.
The war on terror has to continue as the minority who want to return to 14th century caliphate style Muslim states, will do everything to break the UN sponsored process to democratic sovereignty. But the war on terror is unlikely to be won by guns alone. It is best addressed by taking genuine initiatives to restart the Palestine peace plan leading to sovereign formation of a Palestinian state that can live in peace with Israel and benefit from the economic power that Israeli technology can spread to the region if political obstacles can be overcome.
The UN success in Iraq should provide stimulus for the resumption of UN sponsored peace talks between Israel and Palestine where the US is engaged to bring pressure for concessions on Israel and the EU to do likewise on the Palestinians.
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