Calling Things By Their Names

"Following World War One, during which one million Armenians were murdered in Turkey, Polish lawyer Raphael Lemkin urged the League of Nations to recognize crimes of barbarity as international crimes."

A United Nations exhibit that was supposed to be opened by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon yesterday has been delayed following Turkish objections to the inclusion of the above sentence. Speaking on the thirteenth anniversary of the Rwanda genocide in which 800,000 Rwandans were slaughtered in an orchestrated campaign, Mr Ban called for a "global partnership against genocide" and made the U.N. special adviser for the prevention of genocide a full-time post.

Meanwhile, evidently more comfortable arguing over history than taking concerted action on the subject, the international body is still waiting for approval from the Sudanese government to send in U.N. troops to Darfur.