From Winds of Change we get a chance to view the reason why the UN has been so ineffective in solving humanitarian crises.
"My experience with the UN over the past 18 years is in Afghanistan. Here's what I've seen since 9/11...sorry for the garrilous length.
....An enormous and highly profitable international aid apparatus has assembled in Kabul and has largely ignored the input of the Afghan people or their largely American liberators; the latter stand by in disbelief as taxpayers contributions to Afghanistan disappear into outfitting the extravagant needs of European aid community. The UN pays $400 a day (more than a year’s pay for an average Afghan ) plus a generous per diem. This enormous aid infestation has fostered rightful resentment.
The UN and associated NGOs ran through years of aid funding in a matter of months. Now when money cannot be found for reconstruction, the UN issues reports criticizing the parsimonious Americans.
Meanwhile, the UN and NGOs live like pashas. Hundreds of millions of dollars earmarked for Afghans have been transformed into fleets of top-of the-line Toyota Landcruisers, villas and estates to house their workers complete with swimming pools, an endless supply of underpaid servants, luxurious furnishings (accented with looted antiquities,) the latest laptops, video equipment, cases of Johnny Walker Blue and the bling bling ...perks that might even seem excessive to Ken Lay are justifiable expenses charged off to the US. No accountability, no oversight.
They don’t bother cooking the books, they don’t even keep the books!
Afghan citizens fear that vocal objections to this patronizing treatment will result in economic reprisals by the UN...."
This goes part way in explaining the tug-of-war between the UN and the US and its allies in providing aid to the victims of the tsunami.
Read the whole thing, and then hit the links.
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