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Nikki Haley Calls United Nations Human Rights Council ‘So Corrupt’ - The New York Times

UNITED NATIONS — The American envoy to the United Nations, Nikki R. Haley, described the United States on Wednesday as the “moral conscience” of the world, and she dismissed the United Nations Human Rights Council as “so corrupt” without offering evidence. Ms. Haley said the United States would never close its doors to foreigners who flee persecution, even as she defended the Trump administration’s travel ban, which closed the door to refugees from six war-torn, mainly Muslim nations. She insisted that American taxpayers should get value for the money they contribute to the United Nations. She said nothing about whether the United States would help head off a potential humanitarian disaster from famine that the United Nations has warned is looming over 20 million people abroad. Ms. Haley’s remarks, made at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York early Wednesday morning, were her first as ambassador to an audience of foreign policy experts. She called it “an intimidating crowd.” Continue reading the main story RELATED COVERAGE Delicate but Critical Dance for New U.N. Leader and New U.S. Envoy MARCH 16, 2017 UNITED NATIONS MEMO World’s Diplomats, Seeking a Bridge to Trump, Look to Haley FEB. 12, 2017 Nikki Haley’s Path: From Daughter of Immigrants to Trump’s Pick for U.N. NOV. 23, 2016 She briefly channeled her boss, President Trump, by describing the United Nations as “basically a club” that needed to be disrupted. “The fact is, a wave is building throughout the world,” Ms. Haley said. “It’s a wave of populism that is challenging institutions like the United Nations, and shaking them to their foundations.”

AP Investigation: 5 Things to Know About UN Sex Abuse - The New York Times

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Here are key findings on AP's investigation into in the U.N.'s peacekeeping crisis: 1. The AP reviewed 12 years of UN data on sexual misconduct and exploitation, and found an estimated 2,000 allegations against peacekeepers and personnel — signaling the crisis is much larger than previously known. 2. More than 300 of the allegations involved children, AP found, but only a fraction of the alleged perpetrators served jail time. 3. A U.N. investigation report from 2007 obtained by AP shows that 134 Sri Lankan peacekeepers sexually exploited and abused at least nine Haitian children. No one was jailed, and Sri Lanka kept participating in U.N. missions in Haiti and elsewhere. 4. Sri Lanka refuses to specify what happened in the investigations into the soldiers who were disciplined for the child sex ring in Haiti and why so few were punished given that the U.N. internal report cited 134 soldiers. 5. In the latest U.N. annual report, Sri Lanka is cited for its "best practices" involving a paternity payment made recently to a Haitian woman. It took Sri Lanka nearly a decade to make the payment.

The Rwandan Genocide - The New York Times

Michael Dobbs contends that the possibility of intervention by the United States in the 1994 Rwanda genocide was hampered by an absence of “stronger intelligence” about the killings and the challenges of trying to “make sense” of what was happening in Africa. Samantha Power suggested otherwise in her Pulitzer Prize-winning book, “A Problem From Hell.” Ms. Power, now the United States ambassador to the United Nations, reported that within weeks after the mass murder began, the Clinton administration — and the public — had ample information about it. The killings began on April 7 and continued until well into July. As early as April 23, a New York Times editorial stated, “What looks very much like genocide has been taking place in Rwanda.” Ms. Power showed that the main obstacle to American action was not lack of information but political considerations. She cited a memo from a Defense Department official reporting that the State Department was “worried” that acknowledging that genocide was underway “could commit [the United States] to actually ‘do something’. ” She also quoted Susan E. Rice, then director of Africa affairs for the National Security Council, asking in one discussion among policy makers, “If we use the word ‘genocide’ and are seen as doing nothing, what will be the effect on the November [Congressional] election?” RAFAEL MEDOFF Director, David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies