The Pesky Little Issue Of Treaties…

There are a lot of prob­lems in Africa, expo­nen­tial­ly more than may be found in any oth­er part of the world. Extreme Poverty. Dangerous Diseases. Horrible Droughts. Horrendous Wars. Massive Corruption. Extreme Hunger. The list of prob­lems and the extreme nature of each calami­ty caus­es us to turn the page or quick­ly scroll up or down so we don’t have to face the stark imagery. We hide from the imagery not because we are uncar­ing, we do so because some­times the prob­lems seem too large too momen­tous and so we feel help­less. We tell our­selves there is noth­ing we can do so why tor­ture ourselves.

So with all of the prob­lems plagu­ing the Continent of Africa why the out­rage about the death of Cecil the Lion? Why has the death of a sin­gle Lion sparked such out­rage across the Globe? According to the New York Times ‚Zimbabwe’s envi­ron­ment min­is­ter called Friday for the extra­di­tion of the American den­tist who killed Cecil, a 13-year-old lion.

The min­is­ter, Oppah Muchinguri, said the den­tist, Dr. Walter J. Palmer, a hunter from Minnesota, had bro­ken Zimbabwe’s laws. At a news con­fer­ence in Harare, the Zimbabwean cap­i­tal, Ms. Muchinguri said that she under­stood the process was under­way to have Dr. Palmer extra­dit­ed from the United States and that the “for­eign poach­er” need­ed to be held account­able for his actions. “Unfortunately, it was too late to appre­hend the for­eign poach­er, as he had already abscond­ed to his coun­try of ori­gin,” she was quot­ed as say­ing by The Associated Press. “We are appeal­ing to the respon­si­ble author­i­ties for his extra­di­tion to Zimbabwe.”.
Dr. Palmer a 55-year-old Minnesota Dentist and big game hunter said he trust­ed his Two Zimbabwean guides and that he act­ed on their advice before shoot­ing the prized Lion which is a tourist attrac­tion in the African coun­try. Both Men have been arrest­ed and are fac­ing crim­i­nal charges in rela­tion to the inci­dent. Palmer alleged­ly paid $55,000 to hunt the lion. (According to NBC News, the guides, Theo Bronkhorst and Honest Ndlovu, could also face poach­ing charges and, if found guilty, 10 years in jail.)

Dr. Palmer has issued a state­ment as a result of the firestorm which has devel­oped over his killing of the prized 13 ‑year-old Cecil . In his state­ment Palmer said “Again, I deeply regret that my pur­suit of an activ­i­ty I love and prac­tice respon­si­bly and legal­ly result­ed in the tak­ing of this lion,” Dr. Palmer con­clud­ed to his patients. “That was nev­er my intention.”
In the mean­time Dr.Palmer has stayed out of sight of US Authorities amidst the calls for his extra­di­tion to answer to charges in Zimbabwe.
The United States has a treaty with Zimbabwe under which some­one charged with an offense pun­ish­able by a sen­tence of at least a year in both coun­tries can be extra­dit­ed. On Friday, a Justice Department spokesman said the agency did not com­ment on extra­di­tion requests from for­eign governments.
In the mean­time a peti­ton on the White House web­site has col­lect­ed over 200,000 sig­na­tures call­ing for Dr Palmer’s extra­di­tion to Zimbabwe to face charges. The White house main­tains it will react to any peti­tion which col­lects over 100,000 signatures.

In the mean­time there is a side of the American Media which may be fuelling International out­rage. Many have been say­ing that under no cir­cum­stance should Palmer be extra­dit­ed to face charges. They cite a litany of issues includ­ing alle­ga­tions of Human Rights abuse by Zimbabwe and President Mugabe.
This out­rages many observers across the world as it out­rages this writer.
A treaty is a treaty . The United States has a duty to hon­or treaties it is sig­na­to­ry to . Therefore there should be no dis­cus­sion about whether or not Dr. Walter Palmer should be extra­dit­ed to Zimbabwe to face charges . The United States would expect no less were the sit­u­a­tion reversed.
As a mem­ber of the International com­mu­ni­ty and one that takes onto itself the role of lec­tur­ing oth­ers about obey­ing International laws and treaties it is impor­tant that the United States prac­tice what it preach­es and do what is right. It can­not be that there are two sets of rules , one for the rest of the world and anoth­er for the United States.

I recall in 2010 the United States adamant­ly asked that Christopher Coke be extra­dit­ed to face charges in the US for crimes many argued were com­mit­ted in Jamaica. In the end Christopher Dudus Coke was extra­dit­ed, tried ‚and con­vict­ed he is present­ly serv­ing a lengthy sen­tence in a Federal prison. Before all of that how­ev­er the process saw mas­sive street unrest and vio­lence between sup­port­ers of Coke and Police. Police Stations were torched , mem­bers of the secu­ri­ty forces were even­tu­al­ly killed. A mas­sive Military/​Police incur­sion into Tivoli Gardens annexed the com­mu­ni­ty to the rest of the coun­try, but not before an esti­mat­ed 73 peo­ple lost their lives.

The United States just con­clud­ed seri­ous nego­ti­a­tions as part of the so-called P5 and 1 sur­round­ing the issue of Iran’s nuclear pro­gram. The (P5) Permanent 5 , includes the United States, Russia , France, England and China, Iran being the one(1).
The nego­ti­a­tions cen­tered on what the United States and it’s allies includ­ing Israel says is Iran’s pur­suit of Nuclear weapons con­trary to International nuclear non-pro­lif­er­a­tion treaties.
Iran has stead­fast­ly insist­ed that it’s Nuclear pro­gram is for domes­tic peace­ful pur­pos­es only. Notwithstanding the very same sec­tor of the pop­u­la­tion is fight­ing to kill the deal the (P5) reached with Iran with­out offer­ing an alter­na­tive deal. It is impor­tant to note that in the absence of a deal the Iranians would have no restraints on it’s nuclear pro­gram and may sim­ply go ahead and pro­duce nuclear bombs.
It is also impor­tant to note that what the polit­i­cal Right and the bleed­ing heart Liberals who blind­ly fol­low Israel real­ly want is war with Iran.

This brings us full cir­cle to the killing of Cecil. There are those in America who want to dic­tate to the rest of the world how they should act , yet they believe the same rules ought not apply to them. Thankfully that is not a Universal view. Many con­sci­en­tious Americans want Dr. Walter Palmer extra­dit­ed to face charges and so he should .
This writer share that belief.…