Arundhati Roy Quotes

Governments of rich countries spend some $6bn of tax money a year on disaster relief and development aid overseas, while each new earthquake, famine or tidal wave can attract 1,000 aid organisations, from the United Nations Children's Fund and Oxfam to the 'Jesus Brigades' of the American south and other charitable adventurers.

Just a little help, a small security force, a bit of food, can save lives.

So many times, genuine health workers and genuine NGO folks are really just trying to help other humans in whatever capacity they can. But they are perceived as being CIA, and therefore, it blocks their effectiveness.

As conflicts last longer, as the scale of needs increase, we are having to adapt. There is an increasing blurring between immediate humanitarian assistance and long-term development needs.

We have already provided a strong humanitarian response to the problems in the Middle East and that response will be stronger within coming days.

Did Algeria colonize France, or vice versa? Did Egypt colonize England, or vice versa? We [Arabs] are the victims...

The logic of the human rights movement is imperialist. I don't think it was necessarily intended this way. But once you talk about categories like international justice, or you talk about bringing people to justice, or an end to impunity -- I'm just using the standard slogans of the human rights movement -- if you're really serious about that, the only way to do it is by at least the possible use of force. The human rights movement, whether wittingly or unwittingly, has increasingly become a force for a recolonization of the world, in the name of rights…. the human rights movement, if it had its way, would plunge us into epics of war.

... nor do I believe we have a right to use military force to compel the reception of our relief agencies.

The case for intervention is overwhelming … The spectacle of thousands of British subjects kept permanently in the position of helots …

I beg to direct your attention to Africa …. I go back to Africa to try to make an open path for commerce and Christianity.

Though the civilized man may be truly said to have been the greatest enemy of the Indian, yet he has not always been so wilfully, and, in many instances, he has endeavored to be his benefactor. But, though his endeavors may occasionally, for a time, have arrested the progress of the evil, they have never altogether removed it, or been of permanent advantage.

It's a different world out there…. humanitarians will have to operate under the cover of arms—or not at all.

I'm sickened by the way that the delivery of so-called humanitarian aid is once again being used as a justification — or cover — for war.

The first law of disaster relief could well read: every political decision has humanitarian consequences, and every humanitarian program has political implications.

What is the matter with us Indians that we are sick in our own air and these strangers [colonial whites] are well.

… all governments have the moral duty to do everything possible to ensure humanitarian assistance to those suffering because of … conflict, both within and beyond the country’s borders.

The Egyptians prefer the English because they pay for everything. The French take everything and pay for nothing..

[W]e can be certain that, though preached to more than fifty years, if they [the Aztecs] were now left alone, if the Spanish nation were not to intercede, I am certain that in less than fifty years there would be no trace of the preaching which has been done for them.

American Jewish organizations ranked among the top donors to Palestinian organizations providing anywhere from 20 to 30 percent of their total grants.

Postcolonial critics are, I suspect, wrong when they argue that the mass of British people still mourn the loss of empire. But Britain's politicians - and its Foreign Office - have found it hard to adjust to the loss, not so much of onetime colonies as of the global clout the colonies once afforded.

As a nation, Kuwait has been, arguably, free of freedom itself. Claimed in turn by Constantinople, Riyadh, and Baghdad, Kuwait has survived by playing Turks off Persians, Arabs off one another, and the English off everyone.

Stability is when the U.K. and U.S. invade a country and impose the regime of their choice.

The humanitarian ecosystem is diverse - not only is there a variety of traditional humanitarian actors, but the system should also embrace an increasing diversity of private sector actors.

It's oftentimes the case that relief workers, people who've been involved in development projects and foreign assistance, have a real understanding of foreign cultures that the military desperately needs if we're going to be able to work effectively.

I think we are challenged in how we define humanitarian action today and how we relate to long-term needs. We are also confronted with legitimate expectations from the people who want us to respond far more thoroughly to their basic pleas than we would have done in a much more contained form of conflict.