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UN General Assembly Targets Israel with 22 out of 26 Resolutions in 2012

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By the end of this week the current 2012 UNGA session will have adopted 22 country-specific resolutions targeting Israel – and only four on the rest of the world combined, one each for Syria, Iran, North Korea and Burma, according to UN Watch.

On Tuesday alone The U.N. General Assembly adopted nine resolutions on ”Palestinian rights and the Golan,” sharply criticizing Israel yet making no mention of Sunday’s massacre of Palestinian Arabs by Syrian warplanes firing missiles into a mosque in a refugee camp near Damascus.

On the UN Watch’s website Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, underscored the absurdity of the resolution tally. “The U.N.’s disproportionate assault against the Jewish state undermines the credibility of what is supposed to be an impartial and respected international body, and exposes the sores of politicization and selectivity that eat away at its founding mission, eroding the U.N. Charter promise of equal treatment to all nations large and small,” he said.

Read more from this story HERE.

United Nations Green Climate Fund May Require Carbon Tax As Loan Contingency For Developing Countries

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photo credit: tillwe

The Green Climate Fund, designed to channel as much as $100 billion a year in pledges to emerging nations, may try to wean recipients off fossil fuel and encourage them to put a price on carbon, according to an overseer.

The fund may guarantee bank loans in developing nations for projects ranging from wind farms to building insulation and less-polluting agricultural equipment, Naoko Ishii, chief executive officer of the Global Environment Facility in Washington, said yesterday in an interview in Doha. She heads one of two secretariats governing the fund.

Climate projects may be able to get private-sector finance augmented by guarantees from the fund, alongside discounted loans from government or development banks, Ishii said. The 24- member board of the Green Climate Fund, which is still waiting to recieve money from developed nations, may make loans or guarantees conditional on the recipient having the right environmental policies in place, she said.

“I know that conditionality is a very sensitive word, but from the donor point of view, if the money is to be impactful, there must be some policy environment put in place,” Ishii said.

United Nations envoys from about 200 nations meeting in the Qatari capital this week are seeking to extend the Kyoto Protocol and lay the groundwork for a global climate agreement for 2020. Financing from richer nations to the developing world for the next seven years will help cut emissions before the new deal comes into force, Ishii said.

Read more from this story HERE.

Lord Monckton Ejected From U.N. Climate Meeting For Telling Truth

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photo credit: harshil.shah

Stifling Dissent: A lone voice cried out against the global warming sham at the United Nations climate change conference and it was unceremoniously silenced. What are the alarmists afraid of?

Christopher Monckton, the third viscount of Benchley, adviser to Margaret Thatcher and global warming realist, shook up the U.N.’s talks in Doha, Qatar, when he told the delegates that “in the 16 years we have been coming to these conferences, there has been no global warming at all.”

“If we were to take action,” he continued, “the cost of that would be many times greater than the cost of taking adaptive measures later. So our recommendation, therefore, is that we should initiate very quickly a review of the science to make sure we are all on the right track.”

His statement was met with boos and heckles — and, of course, an ejection and seizure of his credentials.

The U.N. will justify the ejection on grounds that Monckton deceptively posed as a delegate from Burma when he spoke. But how else could a skeptic speak at such a gathering?

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Conservatives Ready For ‘Sneaky Treaties’

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Back in September, 36 Republicans in the Senate signed on to a letter requesting that no treaties be brought up for consideration during the precious few days of the lame duck session.

“The writers of the Constitution clearly believed that all treaties presented to the Senate should undergo the most thorough scrutiny before being agreed upon,” they wrote in a Sept. 20 letter to Senate majority and minority leaders Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

“The American people will be electing representatives and senators in November, and new representatives carrying the election mandate should be afforded the opportunity to review and consider any international agreements that are outstanding at the time of their election.”

The signatories promised to oppose efforts to consider any treaty brought for consideration.

Fast-forward two months, and the Senate has begun consideration of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, a United Nations treaty that faces heavy opposition from conservative groups and received only one committee hearing, back in July.

Read more from this story HERE.

U.N. Votes to Recognize Palestine

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UNITED NATIONS — The General Assembly voted overwhelmingly Thursday to grant Palestinians limited recognition of statehood, prompting exuberant celebrations across the West Bank and Gaza Strip and immediate condemnations from the United States and Israel.

The 193-member U.N. body voted 138 to 9, with 41 abstentions, to recognize Palestine as a “non-member observer state,” a status that falls well short of independence but provides Palestinians with limited privileges as a state, including the right to join the International Criminal Court and other international treaty bodies.

Speaking before the vote, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said the U.N. actions offered the only means to salvage a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“We did not come here to delegitimize a state established years ago, and that is Israel,” he said. “Rather we came to affirm the legitimacy of a state that must now achieve its independence, and that is Palestine.”

But the United States and Israel said the Palestinian bid would complicate efforts to restart stalled Middle East peace talks. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement accusing Abbas of having “violated the agreements” between the two sides, and pledging that “Israel will act accordingly.”

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Treaty Threatens U.S. Sovereignty

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WASHINGTON – Former Sen. Rick Santorum, a former GOP presidential candidate and the father of a handicapped child, joined Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, in denouncing the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, saying it would open a “Pandora’s box” of legal interpretations resulting in a “direct assault on us and our families.”

In a press conference on Capitol Hill Monday, both Santorum and Lee said Articles 4 and 7 of the convention, which reference the rights of disabled children, represent a threat to both national sovereignty and the rights of families to make decisions on how to raise their own children.

“Our concerns with this convention have nothing to do with a lack of concern with the rights of persons with disabilities,” said Lee. “They have everything to do with protecting national sovereignty, protecting the interests of parents … and the interests of families.”

Article 4 of the convention compels member states to embrace “economic, cultural and social rights” that are rooted in the concept that government creates rights, as contrasted with the uniquely American view that rights are inalienable and God-given.

This is, Lee explains, “unknown in our legal system” as it presupposes that the state, not God, is the origin, of our rights.

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Now the UN Wants To Use Drones for Surveillance

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photo credit: scazon

UNITED NATIONS — The United Nations wants to use drones for the first time to monitor fighting in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, where Rwanda has been accused of aiding rebels, officials said Friday.

Peacekeeping chiefs have been in contact with the governments of DR Congo and of Rwanda about the sensitive move, which could set a precedent that would worry some United Nations members, diplomats said . . .

“Ultimately, to introduce these, we would need the support of member states to equip the mission,” [UN peacekeeping spokesman] Dwyer said . . .

“The UN has approached a number of countries, including the United States and France, about providing drones which could clearly play a valuable role monitoring the frontier,” a UN diplomat said, on condition of anonymity.

“Clearly there will be political considerations though,” the diplomat added.

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Al Gore Redux: World Bank Report Warns of ‘Devastating’ Global Warming

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photo credit: alex e. proimosA major World Bank report warns that Earth may be heading for a 4° Celsius (7.2° Fahrenheit) temperature rise by 2100 that would bring unprecedented heatwaves, droughts and floods – effects that put some of the poorest nations at highest risk.

“No nation will be immune to the impacts of climate change,” states the new report titled “Turn Down the Heat: Why a 4°C Warmer World Must be Avoided.”

“However, the distribution of impacts is likely to be inherently unequal and tilted against many of the world’s poorest regions, which have the least economic, institutional, scientific, and technical capacity to cope and adapt,” it adds.

The report arrives ahead of the next round of United Nations-led talks aimed at crafting a new global climate pact, which begin in Doha, Qatar in late November.

“As negotiators head to Doha for the climate talks, they must bring a greater sense of urgency and purpose to these negotiations,” said Andrew Steer, president of the World Resources Institute, a think tank.

Read more from this story HERE.

Obama Wins, U.S. Now Backing New U.N. Arms Treaty Talk

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“caveman chuck” cokerUNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Hours after U.S. President Barack Obama was re-elected, the United States backed a U.N. committee’s call on Wednesday to renew debate over a draft international treaty to regulate the $70 billion global conventional arms trade.

U.N. delegates and gun control activists have complained that talks collapsed in July largely because Obama feared attacks from Republican rival Mitt Romney if his administration was seen as supporting the pact, a charge Washington denies.

The month-long talks at U.N. headquarters broke off after the United States – along with Russia and other major arms producers – said it had problems with the draft treaty and asked for more time.

But the U.N. General Assembly’s disarmament committee moved quickly after Obama’s win to approve a resolution calling for a new round of talks March 18-28. It passed with 157 votes in favor, none against and 18 abstentions.

The main reason the arms trade talks are taking place is that the United States – the world’s biggest arms trader accounting for more than 40 percent of global conventional arms transfers – reversed U.S. policy on the issue after Obama was first elected and decided in 2009 to support a treaty.

Read more from this story HERE.

Veteran California Poll Worker Fired Over Protest Against United Nations Observers (+video)

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photo credit: zhenxing88SACRAMENTO (CBS13) – A poll worker is out of a job, and she says it’s all because of an email she sent her supervisor.

The woman says she was concerned about poll inspectors coming to Sacramento for Tuesday’s election.

Shannon Lewis has been a poll worker in Sacramento for 15 years. She said she sent that email and was fired 10 minutes later.

“I just tapped out a really fast email,” said Lewis.

But that quick email ended Lewis’ 15 year job as a Sacramento County pollster. “I just wanted to get my feelings known and get an answer to the question before polling day,” said Lewis.

Lewis’ email inquired about something she saw on the internet, United Nations observers coming to local polling stations. Read more from this story HERE.