Claudia Rosett says Kofi Annan has no business taking a victory lap tour through the Middle East, at least if history is any guide...
Israeli radio has been reporting that Annan will begin a Middle East tour on Monday in Lebanon, and go from there — in what order is not clear — to Israel, Syria, and Iran.Posted by dan at August 21, 2006 12:23 AM | TrackBackWhatever Annan might be cooking up, let’s take a closer look at why Secretary Condoleezza Rice ought to suggest to Annan in the strongest possible terms that the next time he packs his bags, it should be not to tour the Middle East, but to leave the U.N. Until then, the world would be a lot better off if he’d stay home...
...If Annan before stepping down in December is truly desperate to produce a legacy more edifying than Oil-for-Food and Kojo’s Mercedes, he could better spend his remaining four months in office actually enforcing his “zero-tolerance” policy against child rape by U.N. peacekeepers in Africa. Or, unlikely though this is, he could try genuinely cleaning up the bribery-tainted and still secretive U.N. procurement department (which may soon be awarding fat catering contracts to feed the additional 13,000 or so “peacekeepers” the U.N. plans to add to its so-called called interim force in Lebanon, or UNIFIL).