In 1964 Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was imprisoned for life by the then Apartheid government in South Africa.  They moved rapidly to disband democracy movements in that country and imprison all their leaders.  The African National Congress (ANC) was banned and its leaders went into exile, spawning an international movement to demand freedom in South Africa. The ANC regularly called for sovereign nations to intercede in the South African state.  After the Sharpeville Massacre , in which 566 children were killed during a peaceful protest, the world chose to express their condemnation of the internal behaviour of a sovereign state - South Africa.  In 1993 Nelson Mandela was presented with the Nobel Peace Prize, to highlight his plight, as well as reward his bravery, in standing up to a bunch of autocratic anti-democratic thugs.  He became South Africa's first democratically elected head of state when the ANC became the government in 1994.

Recently South Africa, and the ANC government, won the right to sit at the UN Security Council.  Now they have the opportunity to pitch their own vision to the world.

In 1990 Aung San Suu Kyi won elections in (then) Burma decisively.  She was immediately detained and placed under house arrest by the military junta who are still in power.  They moved rapidly to disband democracy movements in that country and imprison all their leaders.  In 1991 Aung San Suu Kyi was presented with the Nobel Peace Prize, both to highlight her plight, as well as reward her bravery, in standing up to a bunch of autocratic anti-democratic thugs.  She remains under house arrest. Her people remain brutalised and oppressed.

Which is why the South African government sided with the Burmese military junta against a UN resolution calling on the Burmese government to ease repression.  The resolution was proposed by the United States and took two years to agree upon within the United Nations.

A lot of people have had a lot to say about the US since it went it alone - without the participation and support of the United Nations - in their war with Iraq in 2003.

The unlikely alliance of anti-US anti-war protesters include: Bare Witness (who pose naked to protest); Iraq Body Count (who attempt to count the fatalities); Muslim Association of Britain (a Muslim group against the war); to the World Socialists.

Everyone has an opinion on how awful and stupid the US response has been.  Many claim that the US has undermined the United Nations and reduced their authority. Maybe people, and nations, should be asking whether their own hypocrisy has earned them the right to be heard by the world's most powerful democracy.  If the United Nations is a toothless, gutless and totally hypocritical talk-shop it is hardly the fault of the United States.  It is the fault of its members.

As Jonathan Katzenellenbogen says in the Business Day, "Voting this way, SA emerged looking comfortable with one of the world’s most brutal military regimes.  Whose side is SA on, anyway?"