Speaking of visas, did the U.S. waive entry visas for the 189 national leaders who gathered at United Nations headquarters in New York for the U.N.'s 50th anniversary bash?
Could there possibly be one standard for the high and mighty and another, entirely different standard for the rest of us?
You claim to be defenders of human rights. But human rights are universal, whereas national ambitions are partial, divisive and fictional.
A draft constitution for Bosnia has been written by U.S. authorities. Does it include recognition of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights? Does it state that its authority derives from the people, as article 21(3) of that Declaration provides? Does it recognize the right of freedom of travel, as article 13(2) guarantees?
There is, by the way, no need for you to create three separate national passports. The World Service Authority passport, mandated by the article cited above, can serve the entire population of the Balkans since it contains a section for affiliate identifications.
Possessing slightly more than 100 acres of tourist attractions in Rome, why does the Vatican have a seat at the General Assembly and full voting privileges at U.N. conferences?
The Holy See is a non-member-state permanent observer at the United Nations, a status shared only with Switzerland. But why, then, does the U.N. treat Pope John Paul II like a head of state when he addresses the General Assembly? The World Council of Churches as a non-governmental organization enjoys no such status and indeed it shouldn't. But, then again, it has no territory.
The Holy See, on the other hand, is the supreme organ of "government" of both the Catholic Church and the Vatican City State. This is an extremely useful combination, joining the absolute with the temporal.
"Biodiversity represents the very foundation of human existence," says a summary of the report. "Yet by our heedless actions we are eroding this biological capital at an alarming rate."
The minimum number of species threatened with extinction is put at 5,400 animals and 26,100 plants, but the estimate only covers species that are known and have been classified by scientists.
Extinctions are 50 to 100 times what they would be without people.
We are indeed fast becoming a cancer on the planet. Give us time and we may rid our home of all life....including ours!
Germany is now joining its European counterparts by lifting the ban on its cultivation. Minister of Health Horst Seehofer said, "We now have strains of hemp which contain such small amounts of the drug, THC that they cannot be used for drug production. The principal argument against a continuing ban on hemp cultivation is therefore no longer valid."
U.S. hemp advocates have long pointed out that it is the one of the world's oldest cultivated crops, that the first two drafts of the Declaration of Independence were written on hemp paper, the sails and ropes of the USS Constitution were of hemp origin and in colonial days farmers were obliged to put 10% of their land in hemp cultivation. They add that smoking marijuana never harmed anyone whereas nicotine and alcohol are prime killers.