Bush's aid coalition "Undermines the UN"

(Hat tip: Dummocrats)

Did you know that only the UN has the moral authority to administer aid to those countries stricken by the tsunamis? Yes! It's true! Or at least that's the way former International Development Secretary Clare Short sees it.

“I think this initiative from America to set up four countries claiming to coordinate sounds like yet another attempt to undermine the UN when it is the best system we have got and the one that needs building up,” she said.

“Only really the UN can do that job,” she told BBC Radio Four’s PM programme.

“It is the only body that has the moral authority. But it can only do it well if it is backed up by the authority of the great powers.”

Cry me a river, Ms. Short. Has it occured to you that perhaps we no longer trust that money funneled through the UN will actually go to those who need it? Heard of the Oil-for-Food scandal?

Ms Short said the coalition countries did not have good records on responding to international disasters.

She said the US was “very bad at coordinating with anyone” and India had its own problems to deal with.

“I don’t know what that is about but it sounds very much, I am afraid, like the US trying to have a separate operation and not work with the rest of the world through the UN system,” she added.

Is this about helping the victims of the tsunamis, or is this about the UN's reputation? I think someone needs to check her priorities.


More: Captain Ed has more.

More: Betsy tells us a little more about Clare Short.

You might remember Clare Short as the pain in the rear former minister in Tony Blair's cabinet who resigned over his support for Bush in the war in Iraq. She was angry then that he wasn't letting the UN lead the efforts in Iraq. Apparently, she is still laboring under the delusion that the United Nations is a useful organization.