>Chris
>
>You mention the Balkans quite a lot as a demonstration of UN uselessness, a reason why it (insert pejorative here).
>
>Just for interest, what is your "take" on what happened in the Balkans?
>
>The UN certainly acknowledged its failure and identified a number of things that must be done better in future. Would you agree that the Security Council's allocation of only 7400 peacekeepers rather than the requested 34000, was part of the failure?
>
>Are are you also referring to more recent problems, e.g. where disagreements over the International Criminal Court threatened the UN's ability to continue (successful) peacekeeping efforts in the Balkans and elsewhere?

I'll start with this:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/yugo/article/0,2763,926815,00.html

The senior western envoy in Bosnia, Paddy Ashdown, read a letter from the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, who called for those responsible to be caught and said the failure to prevent the atrocity would "haunt our history forever".