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Ahern, at UN, commits, sidesteps, urges

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

The taoiseach underlined Irish reluctance with regard to Iraq when he told the assembly that hundreds of Irish peacekeeping troops would soon be heading for another world trouble spot: war-town Liberia.
While Irish reluctance on Iraq will not please Washington, a “yes” to Liberia will go a long way to making amends with the Bush administration that has expressed consistent concern over the future of a nation with special historical ties to the United States.
Ahern’s address to the General Assembly, on Thursday, Sept. 25, was only one of several speeches delivered by the taoiseach in a packed week of receptions, lectures and award ceremonies in both New York and Connecticut.
During his week-long visit — one that coincided with a separate visit to the United Nations by Irish foreign minister Brian Cowen — Ahern signaled Ireland’s concern over the state of the world in general and Dublin’s particular view that the Northern Ireland peace process badly needed elections if it was to continue on a level higher than political life-support.
In this speech to the UN, Ahern painted a grim picture of the world’s condition.
“We are living in a period of great insecurity,” he said. “We are stalked by fear, fear of war, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, famine, disease, ethnic and religious hatred, organized crime.”
Governments, he added, were acting individually and in groups to shield their people from these threats. However, the nature of the challenge required coordinated global action.
“Fortunately, we have the United Nations organization, which brings together the nations of the world in the service of international peace and security,” he said.
“If we did not have already have such an organization, we would surely have to invent it. The tragedy for mankind is that we do not make the most effective use of it. We are frequently told by commentators that the United Nations has failed. All too often, it is difficult to disagree.
“I appeal, therefore, to the governments represented at this General Assembly for a change in our attitude to the United Nations. Let us cease treating it as a tool useful only to the extent that it can deliver our own national agenda.
“Instead, let us use the United Nations to harness our collective resources in the interests of each and every member of mankind.”
Ahern was followed up his plea by announcing the Irish peacekeeping commitment in Liberia.
“I am pleased to confirm that my government, in the next few days, will recommend to our parliament that Ireland’s defense forces participate with a sizable contingent in the forthcoming United Nations peacekeeping operation in Liberia.”
As many as 400 Irish soldiers are expected to take part in the Liberia operation. Given the small size of Ireland’s army and the fact that Irish troops are already serving the UN in Eritrea, East Timor and Kosovo, observers were suggesting this week that a simultaneous commitment to a multilateral operation in Iraq, even one approved by the UN Security Council, is now unlikely.
Turning to Northern Ireland, Ahern told the General Assembly that “regrettably, due to diminishing trust between the political parties,” the devolved political institutions in the North were suspended nearly a year ago.
“Since then,” he said, “we have been working to reestablish the trust and confidence necessary to restore and sustain these institutions.
“Developments over the next few weeks will have a crucial bearing on whether elections, which I believe should take place before the end of the year, will be held in an atmosphere that is conducive to forming a working administration,” the taoiseach said.
In delivering his government’s view that elections were needed before the end of the year, Ahern was reiterating a position that he had expressed repeatedly throughout his U.S. visit.
A day previously, Ahern had stressed the need for elections as a means of ensuring the forward progress of the entire peace process.
“Elections are a key part of the way forward and [British Prime Minister] Tony Blair and I and the leaders of the pro-agreement parties are working to create the conditions for elections to take place that will allow the earliest possible restoration of the institutions,” Ahern said while accepting the inaugural Thomas J. Dodd Prize in International Justice and Human Rights.
The award was jointly awarded to Ahern and Blair in a ceremony at the University of Connecticut.
The prime minister was represented by his deputy, John Prescott, who told the audience that he was “personally convinced that the political conditions will soon be reestablished to allow devolution to be reintroduced.”
Ahern told the gathering — one that included Sen. Chris Dodd, son of the late Sen. Thomas Dodd, and Sen. Edward Kennedy — that the people of Northern Ireland were entitled to working democratic institutions.
“It would be wrong to assume that all of the progress we have made over recent years, the peace — not a perfect peace, but a peace that has been sustained — the institutional reform, the economic and social progress, that all of this can continue in the absence of a stable political environment, and that decisions can be deferred indefinitely,” Ahern said.
The taoiseach returned to this theme in his acceptance speech on Thursday at Fairfield University, where he received an honorary degree of laws and delivered the annual William and Mary Stack Lecture in Irish History and Culture.
Peace was “bedding down” in Northern Ireland and Belfast was “thriving,” Ahern told the gathering.
At the same time, there were no grounds for complacency, he warned.
“There is much unfinished business. Trust has been difficult to build. Change has brought many challenges for all sides,” Ahern said.
Calling for elections at an “early date,” Ahern said it had been five years since the people of Northern Ireland had spoken.
“It is time for them to have their say again,” he said.

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