UPMUNC Day 2: Attack of the Media!

Another hastily scrawled post after a hard day of negotiating.

Day 2 was nothing but committee work, all day long. Committee work constantly interrupted by breaking news from our simulated media. Not wanting to incite a War of the Worlds incident I'll say again, the following "news" is not real. When we arrived this morning we immediately received word that Libya had cluster bombed an opposition held area on its eastern border killing 300 civilians including 200 women. While our committee was drafting a resolution condemning this act and recommending the provision of humanitarian aid we received more updates. The Libyans crossed into Egyptian territory while pursuing fleeing opposition members and bombed an Egyptian highway; Egypt threatened retaliation; it turned out the initial bombing damaged an oil processing facility and oil was spilling into the Mediterranean Sea; 2 female Italian bloggers were kidnapped, apparently by soldiers from the Libyan government and videotape of their torture was released; the Security Council convened an emergency session; there was no end to the madness. With each incident we had to stop, decide whether or not UN Women needed or was empowered to respond, constantly distracting us from the topics at hand. While all of that was happening we were also receiving from journalists and bloggers- through UPMUNC's facebook page- stories and commentaries on what each UN body was and was not doing. The commentator from the Guardian was a particular thorn in everyone's side.

We managed to pass our first resolution- the one condemning Libya's actions- shortly after lunch and after some regrouping were able to get back to the topic of mass rapes in DRC. We decided to impose some structure on our consumption of information from the media, checking in every 1/2 hour. We also got better at issuing our own statements regarding our progress, ending each one with "and we continue monitoring the situation in Libya and Egypt" so that we couldn't be accused of ignoring developments. In the last 2 hours of the day we finally got to roll up our sleeves and dig into the particulars of what we could do to address the problem in both the short and the long term. At one point I had about 10 different windows open on my laptop, each with a different report, resolution or press release from the UN. You really get the sense that everything has been thought of, everything has been spelled out but only fractions have then been funded, implemented or acted upon. Today's 'shake your tiny fist at the absurdity of it all' moment was the realization that MONUSCO has already developed a comprehensive strategy for addressing gender based violence in DRC, which was approved by the government of the DRC in 2009, but 2 years later the strategy has received less than 20% of the $56 million it needs to be implemented.

And now the delegate from Haiti moves for an Unmoderated Caucus lasting 8 hours for the purpose of consulting with Haiti's pillow on important matters of state. Raising a Point of Personal Privilege, the delegate further requests that said consultation be conducted in a quiet room, as Haiti's pillow has a tendency to whisper and therefore be very difficult to hear. As a corollary and to increase the delegate's auditory faculty, Haiti also requests that the room be dark, the inhibition of the sense of sight being commonly held to improve the sense of hearing. The delegate from Haiti thanks the honorable chairs for their consideration and solemnly recommends the other delegates take this opportunity to consult with their pillows as well.