News from Denmark
Today was the day Denmark audio tested the national defence system so at mid day the city was subjected to the ghostly tones of the air warning system. I’ve heard it before, but it never fails to send shiver down my spine. The Danish system uses a very soft warbling noise that lifts itself above the city like a spectre of the past… or things to come? A short while later they ran the all clear siren as well, which isn’t much better.
Whenever I hear the air raid warnings I have the mental image of the cartoon sequence of ‘Goodbye blue sky’ by Pink Floyd in my head.
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The opposition parties, from the far left to the Radikal Venstre have reached agreement in wishing to withdraw Denmark’s troops from Iraq for possible future redeployment in Darfur.
“It is despairing to see genocide played out before our very eyes” said the Radikal Ventre’s defence spokesperson, Morten Helveg Petersen (son of the former foreign minister Niels Helveg Petersen).
Jeppe Kofod, foreign affairs spokesperson for the Social Democrats agreed with him; he said “Compared to stopping a genocide in Darfur, a military solution in Iraq seems less important”.
Foreign Minister Per Stig Møller, (Kons) has responded that Denmark is willing and able to provide troops for both missions, but will only send troops to Darfur if asked to do so by the UN. Møller declared that there was no reason to pull out of Iraq for as long as the people there wished the Danish troops to stay (by this he is referring to the wishes of the Iraqi government).
No party has as yet expressed any support for joining another coalition of the willing against Iran and most have poured scorn on the idea of an attack against Iran.
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A recent poll on the Euro has shown a majority of Danes are currently in favour of adopting the European currency. 36.7% said no and 43.4% say yes. Since all the rest are as yet undecided though, it is impossible to tell if the Danes would adopt the Euro if a new referendum were to be held this year.
2 comments:
I don't understand how one person's suffering could be any less important than another's.
At least we see a cohesive agreement again amongst political parties that intervention is a much needed element of security.
I think the consensus amongst the socialists is that the Iraqi's are able to take care, or at least better care of themselves than the people being killed in Darfur are.
I can understand that, but, as the FM has pointed out, Denmark can send troops to Darfur without having to withdraw any from Iraq, indeed, it seems Denmark already has some troops reserved for just this contingency. So. it would seem the opposition is using Darfur as a means to portray the government's position on Iraq as being biased against a humanitarian agenda.
In other words, they're saying we're only in Iraq for the oil.
On a purely logistical point, I think Danish troops will find Darfus harder to deal with than Iraq unless they are working along side one of the more powerful European nations.
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