Friday, October 01, 2004

United Nations Association is no secret!

Paul Gillies letter

In this letter written by Paul Gillies press officer for the UK branch of Jehovah's Witnesses the same library access statement is made similar to the Branch letter that was sent out to all the branches of Jehovah's Witnesses worldwide. Gillies also states that this NGO relationship with the United Nations is no secret . If it was no secret then why did most of Jehovah's witnesses not know about it until the Guardian News published an article about it? If it is not a secret and there is nothing wrong with what they did, then why are Jehovah's Witnesses who know about the association being told not to say anything about it? Why have some been threatened or disfellowshipped for speaking about it?

Another unbelievable statement says that the initial application required no signature. This is not true. Who has ever applied for something and was not required to sign the application, especially something this involving? There is no way that this could be possible. In fact take a look at this document to see how an NGO had to sign an annual accreditation form showing who their representatives were going to be for that year. Page two of the document states that it must be signed by the Chief Administrative or Executive officer of the organization. If the Watchtower had to sign a paper saying who was going to represent them ever year they were associated which was for ten years, how is it that they did not sign the original application?

Page one
Yearly form
Page two
Yearly form


Next Gillies states: "Years later unbeknown to the Governing Body of Jehovah's witnesses, the UN published "Criteria for Association" stipulating that affiliated NGOs are required to support the goals of the United Nations". This statement is really unbelievable! It basically says they joined a huge organization like the United Nations and didn't have a clue for ten years what they were really about or what they required of them, that they were deceived into believing they could just use the library and did not understand what they had got themselves into. As pointed out before the criteria for association was established in 1946 and updated in 1968. The criteria has always stated that an NGO must support the goals of the UN.
http://www.un.org/dpi/ngosection/criteria.asp

We have already established that the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society had to have known the criteria from receiving the yearly brochures and that they had to sign a yearly accreditation form in which the executive officer of the organization had to sign. It has been proven without a doubt that they had to meet the criteria before they could be approved for association and in fact did meet the criteria by using the Awake and Watchtower magazines to cooperate with the information program. So the question is....Did the Guardian misrepresent the background to Jehovah's Witnesses registration with the United Nations? Decide for yourselves. Here are the two Guardian articles. The first one which came out before the Watchtower withdrew their association and the second after their withdrawal. 

Guardian
Guardian#2

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