One of Tony Blair’s more useful observations was on the idea of “joining the dots” around the world, in order to put together a coherent picture of what is going on. It’s in the spirit of this remark that I bring to readers’ attention this snippet of recent news:
UN: Refugee Situation In Somalia "Worse" than Darfur
The United Nations top humanitarian chief is saying the refugee situation in Somalia is now worse than Darfur. John Holmes said “In terms of the numbers of people displaced, and our access to them, Somalia is a worse crisis than Darfur or Chad or anywhere else this year.” In December U.S.-backed Ethiopian troops invaded Somalia to topple the Islamic Courts Union. Since then over 400,000 people have fled their homes. Unlike in Sudan, Holmes said no emergency camps have been set up to help the refugees. Most of those who have fled, including women, children and the elderly, are camping in fields without access to food, shelter, clean water or medicines.
More crucial context, mentioned in a recent newsletter from the group Voices in the Wilderness, is that the EU is not only “the largest donor to both Somalia and Ethiopia”, but that
“A senior European Union security official has warned the head of the EU delegation for Somalia that … donor countries could be considered complicit if they do nothing to stop them.”
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/africa/article2430108.ece
So what exactly are we to make of the fact that the EU and our favoured ally the US, while bemoaning the situation in Darfur, are now complicit in aggression, war crimes, and, to top it all, of creating a “worse [refugee] crisis than Darfur” in the Horn of Africa? Is there, perhaps, some justification to Richard Howard’s remark that “Humanitarian concern among policymakers in Washington” – and closer to home, we might add - who “argue for liberal intervention, to impose “rights, freedom and democracy”” is “ultimately self-interested”? Perhaps there is ...