George Ayittey Quotes

I think the issue of North Korea is one where the international community as a whole has to work to resolve the crisis.

If President Bush is serious about genocide, an immediate priority is to stop the cancer of Darfur from spreading further, which means working with France to shore up Chad and the Central African Republic.

I think there is a good deal of promise in those discussions as well. I think there is a range of matters that might be discussed between NATO and Russia that can provide a mechanism for talking through these issues, a way to give reassurance on these issues.

I've said for a long time there is no military solution to the crisis in Syria. There has to be a diplomatic solution. ISIL cannot be part of it. Al-Qaeda cannot be part of it, and Assad cannot be part of it. We are dealing with issues that have been going on for centuries, and I'm not sure the administration fully appreciates that.

The question becomes what kind of coalition can we build that will make a transition and empower the people of Iraq? The American soldiers' presence there is an act of provocation. There's a big red ball on the back of every American soldier in that country, so our being there contributes to the crisis, it does not resolve the crisis.

I will call not just on Israel, but on the Palestinians, on the Arab States, and the international community to join us in this effort, because the burden of making hard choices must not be Israel’s alone.

Diplomacy has been exhausted .. Continued instability in the Balkans threatens important U.S. national interests,.

We need a united front against Islamic State and Assad happens to be the decisive power that can fight them. But the situation is preposterous because we also have to respect the calls for change. I would be in favor of a dignified change.

I have underscored my commitment to dialogue and cooperation with our neighboring Turkey, a country that plays an important role for the future of our region. But I still stress that the promotion of this important relations can only take place on the basis of mutual respect without threats of war and questioning of sovereign rights.

A political solution is going to involve neighboring countries... You will have to bring people together to agree on a political process. If that includes supporting a military exercise of some sort without sending troops, that is on the table, as long as this is not the only option that people look at.

I sincerely hope that they (relations between India and Pakistan) will be friendly and cordial. We have a great deal to do...and think that we can be of use to each other (and to) the world.

There is really no crisis except an artificial one...If the great American people will only keep their temper, on both sides of the line, the trouble will come to an end.

What we want is stability and security so we can focus on our own development. But we have these problems in our region, and nobody has been able to resolve them. The whole world was saying that the countries of the regions should step up and resolve their problems, so we stepped up.

...the first casualty (of this crisis) had been the United Nations. It would need an immense effort, an almost superhuman effort, to restore the prestige of that organization

One of the fondest expressions around is that we can't be the world's policeman. But guess who gets called when suddenly someone needs a cop.

We're dealing with such enormous problems today that we have no other choice but to work together. If Iraq fails, if a religious civil war breaks out and the neighboring states are drawn into this conflict, if the Kurds declare independence and al-Qaida takes over an entire province - that's when the consequences will be dramatic.

The United States of America needs to begin to exercise strong leadership to protect the vulnerable citizens and over 100,000 children in Aleppo.

The agreement is fundamentally that we want to try to resolve this. The agreement is that ISIL is a threat to everybody, and we need to come together to find a way to fight ISIL. The agreement is that we want to save Syria, keep it unified, keep it secular. So surely in those very fundamental principles on which we could agree.

If we have the kinds of confirmation that we need, we will once again work with the international community and the organization charged with monitoring compliance by the Syrian government, and we will reach out to patrons of Assad like Russia to put a stop to it.

We will continue to work together to implement the Minsk accord and doing all we can to return to peace with the respect of the integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine.

If the conflict in Lebanon continues, the risk of attacks will grow. This is why we must contribute to a joint (international) responsibility and help secure peace in Lebanon.

Europe can only hold together and stand together, which is very important in times of migration challenges, terrorism challenges, if each country takes responsibility for itself.

With respect to Syria, we are going to continue to work as we have over the last five, six years to push towards a political transition and settlement.

This is the one international institution we have in which governments get together to work collectively for a common purpose. International crises, by definition, require international solutions. Peacekeeping is a response to conflict, is a response to situations in which often it is not the business of any one particular country to get into. It seems to me, therefore, that the world will for the foreseeable future need peacekeeping.

We can see beyond the present shadows of war in the Middle East to a new world order where the strong work together to deter and stop aggression. This was precisely Franklin Roosevelt's and Winston Churchill's vision for peace for the post-war period.