MGG Pillai Commentary View

<< Previous || Next >>

Would the XIV NAM Summit be any different?

MALAYSIA AS HOST TO THE XIII Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit lost her head in the preparations to it. When the sums are added up, she spent far more than she needed, she could afford, she should have. Kuala Lumpur bent over backwards to put on a grand show to compensate for NAM's soulless image and irrelevance. NAM is not what it was. It does not have a clear focus, represents the poor and wretched nations of the world with no idea what it represents or it hopes to achieve. NAM lost its relevance with the end of the Cold War was over, although by 1989, when the Soviet Union gave up the ghost, NAM was amidst signs of decay and decadence.

NAM represents a need. The South needs a voice. But when that voice is hemmed in with contradictions, and all but a handful only too happy to be bought, whatever decisions it takes, especially on contentious immediate issues of the day, must be tinged with suspicion. NAM in Kuala Lumpur unanimously voted against the coming war in Iraq, but does this mean the six UN Security Council members in NAM would caste their vote against war when the SC meets soon to discuss a resolution authorising it? No. Turkey showed the way. For US$26 billion in aid and assistance, a guarantee the Kurds would not get a state of their own, the carrot of sending its troops into North Iraq to prevent the oil fields falling into Kurdish hands, and the US military can do as it pleases on its soil.

How could a country like Guinea, in worse straits, reject outright an offer to buy its vote? Even Malaysia, the host, in the Security Council in 1991, changed its vote to authorise war after a senior State Department official ambushed the then Malaysian foreign minsiter, Dato' Seri Abu Hassan Omar, for breakfast in Los Angeles en route to the vote. So what use is a stirring resolution that is anchored in hope and inaction?

The theme of this NAM summit was to revitalise it. But that was hijacked by the coming war in Iraq. The US wants this war, with or without UN sanction. Indeed it has started, the 200,000 US-UK-Australian troops massed on Iraq's borders have begun limited offensive operations. Now the UN chief weapons inspector, Dr Hans Blix has given Baghdad until 01 March to destroy those weapons that has a range beyond what is permitted. This ensures Baghdad is led to the slaughterhouse when war does break out. Pious statements are made, including at the NAM Summit, that Iraq must comply or face the consequences.

But no thought to the annihilation Baghdad faces. A distinction is made between President Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi people. A cause is built on dodgy statistics and cribbed material from a failed doctoral thesis. He is demonised, and the world decides he is evil. What is frightening about the NAM approach is that Presiden George W. Bush's raison d'etre to destroy President Saddam Hussein is implicity accepted without question. Washington would not, in its single-minded march to war, even allow its allies to challenge or question its intentions. And we are impliedly told that if we do not back Washington we back Iraq and President Saddam. No shades of grey is allowed. Its Western enemies of the moment are France, Germany and Belgium over their NATO vetoes over Turkey. They are in general agreement that President Saddam must be reined in, but that is not enough. So is it any wonder, NAM took the easy way out? The only hope to stave off war is a French veto, and that looks less certain now.

So NAM stirringly calls to halt preparations for war in Iraq, while individual members score points in the drafting of communiques and statements. But what use are these if they are forgotten when the leaders go home. NAM is not the only organisation which looks over its shoulders to see if what it says would offend Washington, but when the language used is not that of the weak, but ersatz strong, like South African President Thabo Mbeki's demand that Iraq must disarm, all it attracts is derision. If NAM was so concerned about it, why did it not get involved in the Iraqi problem when it was brewing. And countries in the Middle East are lobotomised to ignore the wider ramifactions of this war. Hitler was accused of genocide for using massive force to destroy a defenceless minority. When genocide occurs in Africa, the world is roused to anger. When Washington plans one, for that is what this hypertechnical war of offense is, all nations rise in support, especially when aid and assistance is thrown their way. Depleted uranium bombs, weapons with the velocity and damage of nuclear weapons are routinely used, as in Afghanistan, would be used in Iraq. Some of its actions would fall foul of international law. But does any one care?

Conferences like NAM are suffused with good intentions, alway looking to the rosy future, always ignoring the promises and resolutions of past conferences, with no dominant figure to force a change. When past chairmen could not affect changes, how could the present or future chairmen? The South needs an avenue to express its views. But every organisation of the South struggles with its irrelevance. The South-South dialogue, which the Malaysian Prime Minsiter, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, initiated, is hard put to meet. Touted as the South's version of the North's G-7 Summit, is survives in its obscurity, what it says ignored even in Malaysia unless Dr Mahathir has something to say. The Organisation of African Unity, founded on great promise, has only one function: to meet regularly. ASEAN has lost its relevance, as its members look to other forums. Every single one of them is no more than a talking shop. But is there a visionary in the South who could bring NAM to what it should be?

NAM began in 1955 as a bridge between the two Cold War Powers, the United States and the Soviet Union. Its leaders were giants amongst minnows: President Josip Broz Tito, President Gamel Abdel Nasser, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, President Sukarno; as the fervour of non-alignment caught on, brought in others: President Jomo Kenyatta, President Kwame Nkrumah, President Sekou Toure, President Ahmed Ben Bella, President Habib Bourguiba. All stirringly committed to the ideals. But those who followed took sides. Pandit Nehru's daughter, Mrs Indira Gandhi, drifted to the Soviet camp as future Indian leaders drifted to Washington. Others shifted to Moscow or Washington. Others once firmly in the Western or Soviet spheres of influence joined it to reduce its influence and reach. Now it is no more than an amiable club to which no one is refused admission.

Only three countries mattered at this NAM: Cuba, Vietnam, North Korea. NAM can make what statements it must. It would not raise an eyebrow in Washington. But it would react like a wounded bear if Havana, Hanoi or Pyongyang did. The US secretary of state, Mr Colin Powell, lobbies Beijing not only for its vote to authorise war in Iraq; it is also to ask its good offices to rein in Pyongyang. NAM has admitted two more countries to its ranks, represents two-thirds the members of the UN, could have been a strong lobbying force, but is mired in its own irrelevance. That is what it leaves behind after its carefully drafted communique of good intentions and stirring visions of the future few of its leaders bother about as their countries teter on the brink of ruin. Would the XIV NAM summit then be any different?

[This appears in my regular column in Harakah issue 15-31 March 2003]

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@mgg.pc.my