Ducking The Question

Islamic countries tend to be awash in cash - especially since the price of oil surged in recent months. So, what are they doing to help?

Q: Mr. Secretary-General, two questions. How do you evaluate the Islamic world response to the disaster? My second question is, how much is the latest figure of children who are victims and have disappeared in the earthquake?

SG: I don't have the details of that. I will ask Jan if he has the details to answer your question.

Mr. Egeland: We see one third of the victims being children. This is going through the dead, the wounded and also those affected. Actually, it would be more than a third of those who are affected in general. But of the casualties, it is around one third.

And the Islamic world is coming really to the relief of the tsunami victims. What is in this list – I am just going through the latest list of recorded contributions – it is page after page after page of countries, some traditional and very many untraditional. It is Latin American countries. It is Arab countries. It is Eastern European countries. And it is, more than anything, also Asian countries, neighbours. Some of the things we also heard and the Secretary-General was hearing of this morning, from India and Malaysia, has not yet entered our lists even.

The UN is quick to call the US stingy. What about countries who have more money than they can possibly spend living their lives of luxury?
Ah, but there are all those suicide bombers to be underwritten.