Summary
Canadian human-rights lawyer [Ronald Poulton]'s intentions in Cambodia and Tajikistan were to see justice done by encouraging both countries to adopt and use Western legal systems and practices -- presumption of innocence, an independent judiciary, the golden chain of evidence that John Mortimer's Rumpole of the Bailey proclaims from beneath his powdered wig at the Old Bailey.
How can Poulton scold the "warden" of a prison where the prisoners are shackled to the floor each night, when the doors of the prison won't lock, the prison is short staffed, the prisoners have lied to him, and he knows that other similar prisons are much more brutal in their treatment of their captives ?Whatever the hopes were for the UN after the Second World War, it's hard to imagine that Lester Pearson, with his negotiating and horse-trading skills, would be happy with Poulton's summing up of the UN as an organization "doomed to chance."See the full content of this document
Extract
This Road to Hell Paved with Pale Blue Intentions
Pale Blue Hope
Death and Life in Asian PeacekeepingBy Ronald PoultonTurnstone Press, 224 pages, $22The road to hell is paved with good intentions.Canadian human-rights lawyer R...See the full content of this document
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