| Subject: IHT: Sharma: UN not
'mean-spirited'
The International Herald Tribune June 21, 2002 Friday LETTERS TO THE EDITOR; The UN in East Timor Regarding "The Global Class" (May 30) by Joseph Fitchett: Joseph Fitchett's inference that the United Nations has been "mean-spirited" in withdrawing equipment from East Timor could not be further from the truth. Any major downsizing of a UN peacekeeping mission inevitably involves a significant redeployment of assets, the extent of which is determined by the General Assembly in New York, not by the mission itself. However, what Fitchett fails to note is that the United Nations has donated $8.14 million worth of nonexpendable equipment to East Timor's government upon its independence, and $500,000 worth of furniture. This constitutes the largest ever donation to a government provided by the United Nations after a peacekeeping mission, and is the result of a concerted effort by the United Nations, in close consultation with the government of East Timor, to ease the asset procurement burden facing the nascent administration upon independence. Kamalesh Sharma, New York Back to June menu Note: For those who would like to fax "the powers that be" - CallCenter is a Native 32-bit Voice Telephony software application integrated with fax and data communications... and it's free of charge! Download from http://www.v3inc.com/ |