Sunday 16 February 2014

Point of Personal Privilege

I have not yet encountered a method to better simulte the United Nations Conferences for tweens, teens and youngs adults than the Model United Nations (also more commonly abbreviated as M.U.N.). It is not only a way to introduce young minds to the United Nations, but also a great way to spread better global understanding - by getting people to do in-depthresearch on the countries they are assigned to represent. Since these sort of objectives are exactly what UWC would like to achiveve, it was no surprise our latest conference was an M.U.N. Conference.

Delegates of the Human Rights Committee 

The duration of it was not too long, it lasted only two days. I believe it was extremely sufficient and believe it or not, by the conclusion of the conference, I felt more drained than I usually did after my last code for the week. In following with real UN Conferences, there were a number of different councils that were set up to deal with specific topics.

I had signed down for the Human Rights Council which was set to debate on the topics of:
  1.  Advancing emergency response for displaced populations affected by conflict and natural disaster (Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines)
  2. Refugees, internally displaced people and the right to humanitarian aid in Syria
More of my fellow delegates... Can you spot China and Cuba?

I was assigned delegate of the United Kingdom and though this did not affect me personally, was rather pleased to know we had veto rights.

Security Council... who have VETO Rights

We were assigned the history room which is located in the castle as our venue and it was defintely a fitting classroom to be discussing the topic of the Syrian Crisis and other recent conflicts. I had thought we were going to start the deabtes on the first day with the issue of the Philippines, and so had spent my morning in the computer lab with a cup of mocha, frantically looking for information on the UK's stance on the topic. Not only did I wake up ealier than usual for this, I had also used up quite a lot of my prinitng credit (something very very dear to all AC students hearts), only to discover the chairs having believed that discussion on Syria would be more engaging, had chosen to start with the Syrian conflict first.

Security Council in the Great Hall

Luckily my previous knowledge on Syria was far more substantial than the human rights aspect of Typhoon Haiyan and so I was able to manage through. The other beneficial piece of information I had was that the UK tended to be extremely neutral when dealing with such issues. I shadowed and supported the US and whenever I did contribute, I was sure to stick to politically correct, rather morally obvious choices.

On the second day, we continued where we had left off on the first. By this time there had already been a split in the house, with countries like China, North Korea, Cuba and various other Middle Eastern countries banding together. On the other side, there were the Western powers with the UK, US, Germany, France coming together.

After more intense debate and decision making, we passed 3 clauses for a patched together resolution and moved onto the next issue. In the meantime, we survived a terrorist attack from a radical environmental group, dismissed the delegates of Spain (for taking a nap) and Cuba (for passing toxic gas). By this time I had sworn to myself not to become a politician, and soldiered on.

Environmental terrorist in action!

Sadly after the hectic and draining happenings in Syria, many people were eager and keen to pass a resolution for the Philippines so that we coulf adjourn for a break. The resolution for the Philippines was passed tragically as quickly as teh Typhoon had come and gone, and the delegates had left the room at the same speed afterwards.

Modelling the UN look

Though it was no 'working holiday', I did really enjoy my time during the conference. It was a very good chance to e exposed to a array of different views and to take a minute to reconsider why and how we made our own judgments and decisions. 

And so to conclude 'Delegates, the honourable chair would like to close the debate'.

Credits for the photos used go to those who contributed to: https://www.facebook.com/#!/UWCACUN2014