craftiness, witchcraft or skill? gareth evans joins the fray.

I will write about Malaysia, with lots of photos to boot, but I just wanted to quickly observe the following. It is interesting the number of Australian, and politicians of other nations, who find their voice and conscience once they actually leave the craft (as in craftiness, or witch craft, or skill? I'll let you decide) of politics.

Joining Malcolm Fraser as another ex-politician of repute, Gareth Evans, a former Labor foreign minister and ex-deputy prime minister, along with former peace negotiators, has urged Israel and the greater world at large (that being the U.S. and the European Union - though you may as well throw Egypt into the mix) to take the commonsense action of negotiating with Hamas. Hamas (who were elected) have shown a consistent willingness to negotiate since they were elected to power. Israel (and the U.S.) have shown consistent stubbornness in not approaching the negotiation table.

Evans' current post is President and Chief Executive of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG), an independent multinational non-governmental organisation with 90 full-time staff on five continents which works, through field-based analysis and high-level policy advocacy, to prevent and resolve deadly conflict.