To be honest, I still question the genuineness of Kofi Annan in respect to helping the UN define a more influential role in Africa. I say this because he has failed us not only once, but several times. During the Rwanda conflict a top secret memo hit the man's desk in his NYC UN office that warned about impending disaster, a possible plan to carry out ethnic genocide against over 1 million Tutsis. This message was sent to then Mr. Annan by the then commander of UNAMIR, the UN peace keeping force in this country at the time. At the time of the memo landing on his desk, the crisis was possible but still far a distant threat. Kofi's message back to the commander was to not fire a single shot. No vote to see what approach was to be taken but simply a quick reply that was received in minutes by the commander in the far off, crisis torn African country called Rwanda. Hundreds of thousands of our own brothers meanwhile faced an uncertain death. The UN, at the behest of our supposed African savior, was to adopt a hands off approach.. We all know what followed. Simila rly he adopted the same approach to crises in Sierra Leone and many other countries. Additionally, the man seems to be oblivious to the plight of many African countries. If recollection serves me right, he did visit our country in the aftermath of the student massacre. This leads me to believe that the man is totally out of touch with the realities of the continent, or maybe being a diplomat is akin to being a hypocrite these days. Jabou I commend you for forwarding this piece of mail. But, based on his actions, his sermons and communiques mean nothing to me because Africa has not benefited from this man's tenure as so Chief Puppet UN Secretary Generalismo. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html You may also send subscription requests to [log in to unmask] if you have problems accessing the web interface ----------------------------------------------------------------------------