A real-world problem

Imagine you are in the following situation.

You are the foreign minister of your country. You are in New York for a meeting of the General Assembly of the United Nations.

A powerful enemy has been deploying troops on the borders of your country. The “experts” say that there are no plans to invade you, this is just to put pressure on you (invasion would be contrary to the United Nations charter), but if they did invade, your country would last only a few days.

But you know, or suspect, that the enemy leader’s goal is that your country will cease to exist, and that its land, people, resources and culture will become part of his empire. Also, he will have no qualms about spilling his people’s blood to achieve this.

The day before you are due to address the General Assembly, US intelligence tells you that the invasion will occur within the next 48 hours.

You know that words can matter, and that if you do not choose the right words, the consequences will be the deaths of some of your citizens (both soldiers and civilians) and possibly the disappearance of your country. It is very important that when you speak to the delegates of thhe 193 nations on earth, you persuade them not to turn away but to engage.

What do you say?

If you want to know what the Foreign Minister actually said, you should get hold of a copy of the new book Words of Defiance by Bjorn Berge, published by Biteback Publishing of London.

On second thoughts, I will repeat that sentence without the conditional.

You should get hold of a copy of the new book Words of Defiance by Bjorn Berge, published by Biteback Publishing of London.