What Possessed Barbados to Withhold Support for a UN Treaty Prohibiting Nuclear Weapons?

Today, July 7th, a majority of the world’s nations voted at the United Nations to approve a treaty banning nuclear weapons.  Officially called the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, it aims for the ultimate destruction of all nuclear weapons and the prohibition forever of their use.  The treaty will open for signature in September and once fifty countries have signed on, it will enter into force.  The negotiations on the treaty had been taking place for many months, culminating this week in New York.  The nine nuclear armed countries and some of their allies had boycotted the talks arguing that nuclear weapons were a necessary deterrent required by international security concerns.  

Disarmament issues were one of the areas under my portfolio when I represented Barbados at the United Nations and I still have former colleagues involved in disarmament matters.  Some of them posted on social media today expressing their happiness at the successful conclusion of the negotiations and there were even some photos taken of the voting board.  The vote had been passed with 122 countries voting in favour, 1 against and 1 abstention.  Imagine my shock when I saw nothing next to the name of Barbados.  Barbados had chosen not to vote!  Yes Barbados had chosen not to join most of the world’s countries in an international effort to rid humanity of a weapon of mass destruction capable of destroying countless people in one strike. 

For the life of me, I cannot fathom why Barbados chose not to support the treaty.  First, as a small island developing nation we are more vulnerable than most countries to the threats facing the world, whether environmental, economic or security.  Any use of a nuclear weapon in our region would devastate us and our neighbours with our small land masses and dependence on the sea around us.  Nuclear weapons are an existential threat and as a country we have always opposed them.  Why would we suddenly change our stance? Second, this recognition of the severity of the threat posed by nuclear weapons led to the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean establishing the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean (Treaty of Tlatelolco) in the 1960s.  The Treaty resulted in the establishment of the world’s first nuclear weapons free zone (NWFZ).  Barbados is a party to that Treaty and I fail to grasp how we can adopt an antagonistic position on a universal treaty with similar disarmament intent. Barbados, Dominica and Nicaragua were the only three countries from the 33 Latin American and Caribbean countries party to the Treaty of Tlatelolco to not vote.  I am unaware why Dominica and Nicaragua did not vote but what interests me most is ascertaining why Barbados opted to act like it did.

Five years ago in 2012, Barbados also chose to vote in a contrary manner to most of the world.  On that occasion it was the UN General Assembly vote on Palestinian statehood, a course of action that lacked in principle and betrayed all the comments successive Barbadian administrations have made about self-determination.  While I remain fundamentally opposed to how Barbados voted then and the justification offered by the Prime Minister for its vote was nonsensical, I understood why it was done.  The Zionist pressure on his government was not something he or his Foreign Minister could resist, especially when a prominent Christian Zionist holds much sway with their party.  Political and economic expediency trumps principle every time when it comes to politicians.  On this instance though, I am at a loss to comprehend why Barbados would have a problem with an international treaty banning nuclear weapons. 

Of Dogs & Slaves: An Ex-Diplomat’s Perspective on the Egyptian Minister’s Comments

I wrote an article about the despicable language used by an Egyptian Minister at a recent African Union conference.  It was published today by MuslimARC, a group that focuses on education and awareness about racism, particularly amongst Muslims.

The article can be read below or here.

The news broke on May 31st of an incident at a United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) held in Nairobi where the Egyptian Minister of Environment called Africans “dogs and slaves”.  Egypt currently holds the Presidency of the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN).  African countries were justifiably outraged and a statement dated May 29th was issued by Yvonne Khamati, chairman Africa Diplomatic Corps Technical Committee (ADCTC), condemning Egypt’s behaviour and calling for an apology.  The statement also requested that Egypt does not negotiate or take any leadership position on behalf of Africa and that the country should resign as president of AMCEN with immediate effect.
 
In response, and unsurprisingly, the Egyptian Government took an adversarial stance.  The Egyptian Foreign Minister denied that the abhorrent language had been used and instead attacked Ms Khamati, accusing her of committing excesses in her statement.

This incident does not shock me in the least.  I met and worked with a number of Egyptian diplomats in my fifteen year Foreign Service career.  I want to offer some context to this incident so that it is not viewed as an isolated slip of the tongue but rather understood within the prism of how certain segments of Egyptian society operate.

Egypt is located in Africa but as a whole Egyptians identify themselves as Arab and Muslim and not African.  However, in the world of multilateral affairs where countries form different alliances to advance their interests, Egypt finds it convenient to claim its African background and developing country status.  It thus straddles various negotiating blocs within the United Nations system, with the Group of 77 and China, the Non-Aligned Movement, the African Group, the Arab Group, and the Organisation of Islamic Conference being the main ones.  They play a leadership role in most of these groups and in particular the African Group.  They exert a significant level of influence amongst African countries and from my perspective, often time their behaviour in leading the African Group bordered on the patronising.  I often observed the African Group, at the urging of Egypt, adopt blanket positions on issues that were not necessarily in their interest.  While repeatedly making claims of being African, I never in 15 years saw an Egyptian diplomat who was dark-skinned. The same can certainly be said of other North African countries like Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia. 

The issue of Palestine is used by Egypt and other Middle Eastern countries as a convenient tool and one constantly sees Egypt making an elaborate show of championing pro-Palestinian resolutions.  The fact is that the Egyptian government along with the Palestinian Authority are the main enforcers of Israeli apartheid.  There is an inherent contradiction in Egypt taking the floor at the United Nations to criticise Israel and table resolutions on Palestine when it allies with Israel in blockading Gaza.  A key component of this Egyptian facade is lobbying within the negotiating groups it belongs to in order for its resolutions to win bloc support.  At the United Nations, bloc sponsorship provides the perception of popular backing.  When their petitioning efforts fail, they are incredulous and particularly at those “weaker”, “smaller” or “lesser” countries whose support for the more enlightened Egyptians should be unconditional.  It appears that something similar happened at the UNEA meeting in Nairobi where Egypt was unable to obtain the collaboration of all African countries for a position concerning Gaza.

I remember quite vividly an incident that occurred when I was working at my country's Permanent Mission to the UN in New York.  The Egyptians wanted the states of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) to agree to a collective position on a report of the Human Rights Council (HRC) because one issue of many in the report related to Palestine.  I was negotiating on behalf of the Caribbean Community countries (CARICOM) and refused to give our backing because we viewed a common NAM policy on the report of the Council as outside the mandate of the group.  The Egyptians were furious and accused us of betraying Palestine.  My Egyptian counterpart then accosted me and berated me for forgetting my roots.  This is nothing as reprehensible as calling Africans “dogs and slaves”, but her behaviour stemmed from a similar place of feeling superior towards “those” African people.  In accusing me, a non-black Muslim of abandoning my roots, the underlying questions being asked were: how can you small islands, many with populations predominantly of African descent, have the audacity to differ with Egypt; and furthermore, how dare you, a non-black person and a Muslim, not stand with your Arab brothers.

Egyptian diplomats are overwhelmingly from the country’s secular elite and clearly disconnected from the average Egyptian.  The make-up of their government and diplomatic core is a reflection of the rigid social stratification of Egyptian society centred on skin colour and class.  My views were only reinforced by what I witnessed when I spent a few months in Cairo- the class structure, the way the elites behave and live, the manner in which skin colour is closely linked with class, wealth and standing, etc.

The unfortunate reality is that this furore will blow over because in international affairs, principle and ethics are more often than not trumped by interests.  The countries involved will for the sake of mutual convenience “make up” and the usual order will continue.  Moreover, with the fast pace at which news stories become stale, some other matter will overtake this in prominence.  Unless of course, we as Muslims concerned about the racism being espoused and practised by our own, raise our voices, speak out and take action.     

New York City and Multilateral Diplomacy

I travelled to NYC on Sunday and am due to leave tomorrow.  This is a work trip so nothing much to be excited about.  Not to mention, the weather, which had been relatively well-behaved for a stretch of days before I arrived, decided to return to sub-zero levels.  I have experienced many winters, both in the UK (London and Durham) and the US (NYC), but I don’t think I will ever become acclimatised to cold weather.  I am a mild weather person.  I love spring and autumn and am not a fan of extreme summer heat.

I have been back a few times to NYC since leaving the last day of December 2009 but this was the first time I had returned to go to a meeting at the UN.  It was like déjà vu.  The UN may have undergone some physical changes but substantively it remains the bureaucratic talk shop it has always been.  It was a painful few days.

On a positive note, it was nice to see some old colleagues, eat some food that I don’t have access to in Barbados and be able to purchase a few items that are either unavailable in Barbados or priced exorbitantly.