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Top UN official quits, citing rights body’s perceived lack of power to stop Middle East “genocide”

todayNovember 3, 2023 156

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Former top UN High Commissioner, Craig Mokhiber, says the continued crackdown on individuals who speak out against the ongoing violence in Gaza cannot be suppressed for too long.

Mokhiber, who served as the Director of the New York Office for Human Rights, stepped down earlier this week and has shared his resignation on social media after 31 years of working for the international human rights body.

In his letter, he says a genocide is unfolding before the UN’s eyes, and the organisation appears powerless to stop it.

“As someone who has investigated human rights in Palestine since the 1980s, lived in Gaza as a UN human rights advisor in the 1990s, and carried out several human rights missions to the country before and since, this is deeply personal to me,” he stated.

Speaking to the American news podcast, Democracy Now, Mokhiber said he decided to leave because the UN, according to him, is failing in its duty.

Mokhiber’s resignation comes just days after the Israeli military attacked the Jabalia refugee camp, killing dozens of innocent people.

According to Gaza’s health ministry, more than 50 people were killed in the attack and 150 others were wounded.

Meanwhile, since the violence in Gaza escalated on the 7th of October, the UN has lost 70 of its members from the Agency for Palestine Refugees.

According to the UN, this is the highest number of aid workers killed in a conflict in such a short time. 

Written by: Nokwazi Qumbisa

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