Many people think the U.N. is a joke, and that august body itself seems determined to confirm them in their opinion. Recently Zimbabwe was designated to head the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Development. That's the same Zimbabwe which was once a prosperous nation named Rhodesia but whose fortunes collapsed after the former government was replaced, following a costly civil war in the late 70's, by a collection of thugs, tyrants, thieves, and incompetents under thug-in-chief Robert Mugabe.
It's the same Zimbabwe which is the proud possessor of the world's highest inflation, at more than 2000%, and mass unemployment. Human and civil rights abuses are rife. Entire families of farmers have been evicted from their homes and their land confiscated to be given to people who don't know the difference between a sheep and a cow.
As if to celebrate their new status as the head of the U.N.'s Commission on Sustainable Development it was announced on Wednesday that households in the country will be limited to four hours' electricity a day so that wheat farmers will have enough power to irrigate their crops.
That's the same U.N., by the way, that appointed Libya to chair its Commission on Human Rights in 2003. In the halls of the U.N. building irony, like cosmic radiation, is completely unperceived by those through whom it passes.
RLC