UN: Civilian's needs to guide humanitarian aid efforts

by Xinhua writers Bai Jie, Gu Zhenqiu, Wang
Xiangjiang

UNITED NATIONS, May 4 (Xinhua) -- UN humanitarian
chief John Holmes said here on Monday that civilian's needs are the only thing
which guided the world body's efforts in dealing with a humanitarian crisis.

"The basic principles we operate on are the classic
humanitarian principles of independence, neutrality, impartiality, and
humanity," said Holmes, the UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs,
in an exclusive interview with Xinhua.

"It means we are responding entirely to people's
needs. We don't care who those people are, what political party they come from,
what side of a conflict they're on, what religion they are ... these are
absolutely irrelevant," he said.

"The only question which guides us is their
humanitarian needs when they're suffering," said Holmes, who is also UN
emergency relief coordinator leading the Office for the Coordination of
Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Highlighting that civilians need help on a totally
neutral and impartial basis, Holmes said the UN agency has "nothing to pursue
politically" when addressing a humanitarian crisis.

"We are simply trying to act as humanitarian,
impartial actors with UN agencies, nongovernmental organizations and the Red
Cross and Red Crescent Movement," said the under-secretary-general, citing the
Chinese Red Cross Society as an example that he saw during his two-day trip to
China in late April.

"I was able to see in Beijing the Chinese Red Cross
Society, which is a huge and influential and effective organization, operating
on that basis ... we will respond on the basis of those needs wherever they are,
whoever the people are on the best basis we can," he said.

Talking about the priorities of the UN humanitarian
operation, Holmes said there are "very many," including conflicts areas like
Sudan, Sri Lanka, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Chad and others which he has
frequently visited.

Preventing and reducing the negative effects of
natural disasters is another issue high on the agenda of the
under-secretary-general.

"There is a huge challenge in the future, which is
dealing with natural disasters," he said, adding there are an increasing number
of natural disasters coming from climate change.

He called for better preparation to respond to the
disasters with more emphasis on trying to reduce the impact of disasters before
they happen, such as anticipating where they're going to happen, what that means
in terms of where people should live, how they should behave, what kinds of
measures should be put in place so that countries can reduce the loss of life
and damage to property.

"That's a better investment than just responding to
the event," he said.

Holmes was appointed as the under-secretary-general
by UN Secretary-general Ban Ki-moon on March 1, 2007, after he left the office
of former British ambassador to France. He was awarded a knighthood in 1999,
primarily for his role in the Northern Ireland peace process and the Good Friday
Agreement.

News Analysis: UN racism conference opens amid concern over criticism on Israel

BEIJING, April 20 (Xinhua) -- A major United Nations
anti-racism conference opened Monday in Geneva despite a boycott from the United
States and several western countries owing to concern over a possible criticism
on Israel.

Analysts said the Western walkout reminded the world of the unhealable political rifts between the Western and Islamic nations.

WESTERN PULLOUT

The Netherlands, Germany and New Zealand announced
their boycotts Sunday, following Australia, Canada, Israel and Italy which had
said they would not attend the weeklong session slated for April 20-25.

The U.S. State Department announced Saturday that the
U.S. would not attend the UN conference on racism due to the wording of its
final document that could possibly arouse criticism against Israel.

The pullout of Germany is considered significant as the country has played a leading role in U.N. anti-racism efforts as a result of its troubled historical legacy. It is also the first time in decades that Germany has missed a major UN conference.

A Durban II ?

The five-day Durban Review Conference, held in Durban
of South Africa in 2001, was aimed to evaluate progress toward the goals set by
the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and
Related Intolerance.

The United States and Israel walked out 2001 session
owing to attempts to liken Zionism to racism when a parallel NGO forum equated
Israel's policies in the occupied territories with apartheid in its strongly
worded final declaration. Although the UN Commission on Human Rights dropped the
reference in the main forum, concerns about anti-Semitism remained in the final
text.

The 2001 session was later nicknamed as Durban I,
during which activist groups staged anti-semitic marches and protests.

Will the Geneva conference be a replay of Durban I,
namely Durban II? Concern is high that the meeting may descend to another
bickering and onslaught against Israel.

Hillel Neuer, head of UN Watch, a group that monitors
the world body for perceived bias against Jews and Israel, described the Durban
meeting as a "festival of hate and anti-Semitism" and predicted the Geneva
session would be just as bad.

Plans to reaffirm the 2001 document were of
particular concern to the Barack Obama administration.

On Feb. 27, the U.S. announced that it would not
participate in further planning talks or the conference itself unless changes
were made. Before announcing its boycott, the U.S. had been pressing its
European allies to lobby for an acceptable document.

Western countries were fiercely opposed to parts of
early drafts for a Geneva declaration that suggested Israel was driven by racism
in its treatment of Palestinians, and included proposals to bar "defamation of
religion."

But the latest version of the draft issued on
Wednesday showed all references to Israel had been dropped. On Friday,
negotiators, including Western and Muslim states, said they had ironed out the
most controversial issues relating to religious discrimination and the Middle
East in the draft declaration.

However, U.S. State Department spokesman Robert Wood
said the draft still reaffirmed unacceptable parts of the 2001 Durban
declaration referring to the Middle East conflict.

The concern over a political infighting is higher
especially when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has called for
Israel's destruction, is expected to attend the meeting and to make a speech.

"His track record does not leave us feeling very
comfortable about what he might say, given what he's said in the past on the
Holocaust, on Israel and on anti-Semitism," one official told Reuters about
Ahmadinejad.

"We don't normally walk out of conferences run by the United Nations and we'd rather avoid doing it. But that doesn't mean that there aren't red lines that, if breached, would prompt us to take action."

MIXED VIEWS

With several countries joining the U.S. boycott, the
European Union could not reach a common position on attending the conference.

The Czech Republic, which currently holds the
rotating EU presidency, and Britain announced to send low-level delegations
headed by their ambassadors in Geneva.

A source close to French President Nicolas Sarkozy's
office told AFP late Sunday that "France will go to Geneva... in order to
articulate its standpoint on human rights issues."

Earlier Sunday, Belgium's Foreign Minister Bart Ouvry
urged EU partners to act in concert and take part "in large numbers."

Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura said
Monday that Japan would attend the conference and regretted the U.S. boycott of
the event.

Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human
Rights, said she was "shocked and deeply disappointed" at the boycott.

"A handful of states have permitted one or two issues to dominate their approach to this (anti-racism) issue, allowing them to outweigh the concerns of numerous groups of people that suffer racism and similar forms of intolerance to a pernicious and life-damaging degree on a daily basis all across the world," Pillay said in a statement.

UN rights chief shocked by U.S. boycott of anti-racism conference

GENEVA, April 19 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations' top human rights official said on Sunday she deeply regretted the decision by the United States to boycott a major UN anti-racism conference to be convened in Geneva on Monday.

"I am shocked and deeply disappointed by the United States decision not to attend a conference that aims to combat racism, xenophobia, racial discrimination and other forms of intolerance worldwide," said Navi Pillay, the UN high commissioner for human rights. Full story

Hamas: many countries responded to Israeli, U.S. pressures to boycott Durban II

GAZA, April 20 (Xinhua) -- The Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) said many countries boycotted the UN World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) due to quick response to Israeli and American pressures.

The Durban II conference opened in Geneva Monday without participation by the United States, Israel and some major allies, while a lot of other countries boycotted the conference due to the participation of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Full story