Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Of Samantha Power at the UN, E-Bay & Obama, But What of Sri Lanka and Sudan?


By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, June 5 -- In the second act of today's double switch which moves Susan Rice to National Security Adviser, Samantha Power is to be nominated to replace her as US Permanent Representative to the UN. 
  Power wrote the book on genocide -- but some wonder what she DID about it, for example the 2009 slaughter of 40,000 Tamils in Northern Sri Lanka.
  Inner City Press covered that mass killing, and was present when anguished diaspora Tamil denounced, among others, Samantha Power for inaction. Would she have tried to at least get it onto the Security Council's agenda? It's a question that should be asked. See BloggingHeads debate here, at Minute 36.

  Back in 2008, Inner City Press was there when Power arrived at the UN's Delegates Dining Room to raise money from and with E-Bay's founders to educate American on foreign policy. Click here for that story, "Chasing the Flame With Cheese Cubes," a/k/a Fondue. What ever happened with that? It also should be asked.

  In 2010 when Samantha Power visited the US Mission to the UN, Inner City Press asked her why President Barack Obama had not mentioned Sudan much less Darfur in his General Assembly speech. Power put a good spin on things; one wonders if she'll be ask active on Sudan and South Sudan as has been Ambassador Susan Rice. Watch this site.