http://sarahhonig.com/2011/12/09/another-tack-fools-rush-in/
Literally just before stepping down from office, Switzerland’s Micheline Calmy-Rey has reaffirmed her country’s commitment to interfering in our affairs. As outsiders, uninitiated in the mysteries of the Swiss system, it’s not easy for us to define her role but as president of the Swiss Confederation, Calmy-Rey was head of government and, as head of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, she was foreign minister.
Said Calmy-Rey spoke at a recent Geneva get-together summoned, in the words of an official Swiss Foreign Ministry communiqué, “to review the achievements of the Geneva Initiative and analyze its potential in the light of current developments in the Near and Middle East.”
We may well ask “what achievements?”
However, the palpable absence of any hint of achievement in itself made the sorry Geneva reunion a fittingly surreal farewell bash for Calmy-Rey. Thirty Israeli and Palestinian “negotiators” were flown by Calmy-Rey’s ministry first-class to Geneva and put up in a posh hotel to mark the eighth birthday of the stillborn initiative, sponsored and bankrolled by the Swiss.