By Otto Spijkers

Today, we celebrate our freedom in the Netherlands. 5 May was chosen because it marks the end of the German occupation of the Netherlands during the Second World War, but it is really a day to celebrate our freedom in general. Yesterday evening, we commemorated those who fought and died, in the Second World War and thereafter (in missions overseas, including UN Peacekeeping Missions), so that we can now enjoy this freedom. This Remembrance of the Dead is held annually on May 4. Each year, at 8 o’clock in the evening of May 4, the entire country is silent for two minutes. The main ceremony is held at Dam Square, Amsterdam (see picture). This ceremony mainly consists in the laying of wreathes in front of the National Monument on Dam Square, in commemoration of the dead. Also, the winner of a high school poetry-competition reads his or her winning poem on the square, just after the entire nation observed two minutes of silence. The poem is meant to commemorate those who went, fought and died for our freedom. This year the winner was Bahar Azizi, an 18 year old Dutch girl born in Afghanistan. I liked the poem so much that I made an attempt to translate this Dutch poem into English. So here it goes: Continue reading →

By Otto Spijkers

The issue of equitable geographic representation at the various organs and bodies of the United Nations is always topical, so I guess it deserves a blog post even though I have no recent development relating to this issue to address specifically. It is an interesting topic, both for politicians and for those who like to work with statistics and calculators. The end-result of any application of the principle of equitable geographic representation, I guess, is always based on both cold calculation and hot politics. For a UN report on the issue, see here. So let’s look at some examples where we can apply the principle… Continue reading →

By Otto Spijkers

The Dutch Member of Parliament, Mr. Geert Wilders, published his Fitna-film (see also my previous post ). Somewhat surprisingly, the two most effective objections to the movie so far were made, not against the message of the movie, but rather against the unauthorized use in that movie of other people’s material. First, the author of a cartoon ordered Wilders to remove footage of his cartoon from the film (which was done), and today a rapper was awarded financial compensation, to be paid by Mr. Wilders, for immaterial damages caused by the use of a picture of the rapper posing as the murderer of Van Gogh. This picture was presented in Fitna as a picture of that murderer. Mr. Wilders used that picture without the photographer’s permission, and thus Mr. Wilders also had to pay that photographer. But I want to focus on the message of Fitna, not the copyright stuff. More specifically, I want to share with our readers the reaction of our Minister for Development Cooperation. On 11 April, Mr. Bert Koenders, our Minister for Development Cooperation, visited the Brookings Institution in the United States of America, and presented there a Dutch perspective on freedom, religion and democracy in the age of the 24/7 news cycle, addressing also the Fitna-movie and the responses it triggered all over the world. I believe the speech is really interesting, and that is why I would like to share with our readers the most interesting parts. It starts as follows: Continue reading →

By Otto Spijkers

As I mentioned in an earlier post, each Friday some of the interns at United Nations Headquarters used to go to the delegates lounge after work to have a drink or two and make plans for the weekend. It appears that those days are over; not just for me (I left UN Headquarters on 28 March 2008), but also for future generations of UN interns. In this post, which will be my last post about the UN Headquarters internship programme, I will share with the reader the reasons given by the United Nations for no longer allowing the UN interns access to the Delegates Lounge, which was one of the privileges the intern-community greatly enjoyed. Continue reading →

By Otto Spijkers

Geert Wilders, the leader of the Dutch opposition party called Partij voor de Vrijheid (Party for Freedom) plans to release a short film (15 minutes) warning about the Islamization of the Netherlands and about the supposedly violent character of Islam in general. The video, which will be released at the end of this month, has already been the talk of the town for months. The Dutch government has tried to persuade Wilders not to make or show his movie, fearing reprisals from parts of the Muslim world, aimed not only against Wilders but against the entire Dutch country and its people, including those living and working abroad. In fact, a national security strategy was drafted by the Dutch government especially for this film, indicating the measures to be taken in case Dutch embassies would be under threat etc. etc. Continue reading →

By Otto Spijkers

Every spring, summer, and fall, around 200 students come to UN Headquarters to do an internship there. I guess that with each season, and each session, the same question comes up at some point: namely, whether the United Nations – or someone else – should pay for the expenses etc. of the interns that come to New York. At the moment, the United Nations does not pay for anything (the website refers to some opportunities for financial aid, but those are outside the UN family, and the UN does not assist in obtaining that financial aid). In fact, interns even have to find their own accomodation, which can be quite difficult if you know nobody in New York (some interns use craigslist, others end up, at least for the first few weeks, in a youth hostel or YMCA). It is obvious, when you look at the intern community, that the ‘unpaidness’ of the internship causes the European nations to be overrepresented (especially Germany, but that may be true for ‘my’ session (Spring 2008) only). There aren’t that many Americans, Australians, and Canadians here. Those interns that come from lesser developed nations (a terrible expression, but I do not know a better one), have all – as far as I am aware – studied, or are currently studying, in European or North-American universities. In this post, I would like to list a few arguments/points that were made when we discussed this issue of payment among the interns. I do not share all those; in fact, I may disagree with most of them. Continue reading →