they would no longer recognize because Chile broke some of its parameters through its increased military pres-ence on the continent.The treaty was

originally signed by 12 nations as an agree-ment on the peaceful division and use of the Ant-

spotted near the Philippines by British intelligence, according to an update issued to the council.Both claims were disputed by the

Chinese delegate, who said while they have no intention in engaging in military battles with Chile, they are interested in laying claim to open land on the continent.The discussion called into ques-

tion the Antarctic Treaty of 1959, which the Chinese delegate said

The country would accept humanitarian aid if the situation worsened, he said.The council continues to work Fri-

day to draft comprehensive solution designed to address the long term.“The main concern of the U.N.

is to de-escalate the situation at all cost,” the council said in an agreed news release.

delegate from Syria said. “We are currently preparing to take action. This is a horrible encroachment of our sovereignty.”Turkish Foreign Affairs Minister

Mevlut Cavusoglu told the council that they would not be request-ing military aid from its allies, adding that “We have a special but extreme situation in Turkey.”

MMUN World News & ReportVOLUME IX ISSUE 3 MMUN.ORG Friday, February 12, 2016

Turkey invades following ISIS attack

Mortar shelling from Syria cross-ing the Turkish border caused the deaths of eight Turkish soldiers Friday morning and resulted in retaliatory action that led to the capture of a Turkish pilot.The situation escalated over the

course of the day with Turkey sending in tanks, ground troops and air support into Syria to at-tack ISIS bases there, according to reports issued to the Security Council North, which called an emergency meeting at 12:45 a.m. central time.The Security Council North

ultimately agreed in a 4-1 vote with two abstentions to send in Rus-sian Special Forces to rescue the sounded Turkish pilot from ISIS captivity, despite the fact that the pilot in a video released by his cap-tors said the plane that shot him done had Russian insignia on it.The delegate from Russia denied

that the plane was theirs and agreed to contact the government in Moscow to confirm that. “Russia will be transparent in this

issue,” the delegate said. “If it was a Russian aircraft, it was against my knowledge.”ISIS operatives told the council

in the video that the pilot would

byAL-JAZEERA be executed shortly, something del-

egates from China and Chad said happens all over the world.The Security Council should not

risk escalating the situation on be-half of one pilot, the delegate from China said.While the pilot was successfully

recovered, the conflict between Turk-ish, Syrian and ISIS forces had not been resolved as of Friday morning. Turkey, though, had decided to

not move its forces into the coun-try any farther as a result of Jorda-nian airstrikes targeting ISIS bases in Syria, something the kingdom was doing with permission from the Syrian government.“Turkey and Syria have been in

contact with each other in some respect and have come to a loose agreement regarding the temporary positioning of the Turkish military personnel within Syria to protect their own border,” the council said in an agreed news release. “Both parties acknowledge that this is not a long-term solution.”Despite the short-term agree-

ment, the Syrian government through Foreign Minister Walid Muallem condemned Turkey’s military actions.“Syria is deeply offended by the

Turkish troops that have entered our land without permission,” the

OIL FIELD, 2A

Dispute follows Antarctic oil field discoveryA dispute over a newly discovered

oil field found by Chile in Antarc-tica led to 37 Russian researchers being trapped in Australia’s Antarc-tic territory.The Security Council South

called an emergency meeting to address the situation around the oil field, which is thought to be the largest in the world, surpass-

byBBC

ing even the Ghawar field in Saudi Arabia.With the oil field straddling the

Chilean border and a territory of unclaimed land, China moved ag-gressively to claim the entire field, Chilean intelligence released in an announcement. The Chilean military subsequent-

ly secured an area extending 10 miles into the unclaimed territory.A Chinese naval fleet was also

One of the Russian scientists makes a plea to the Security Council.

Top: Delegates discuss a crisis involving Turkey and Syria late Thursday night. Bottom: Turkish Foreign Affairs Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu answers questions posed by Security Council North delegates.

Small arm sales targeted in approvedresolution

A resolution attempting to limit the illicit brokering of small arms and light weapons dominated the conversation Friday afternoon in the General Assembly plenary committee.The resolution, which ulti-

mately passed, discusses strength-ening border security, increasing international communication and stepping up law enforcement training.The main concern was sovereign-

ty, the delegate from Spain said.“With the resolution, we focused

on the sovereignty and the ability for nation-states to create their own law enforcement mecha-nisms so [that] they are relying on themselves for border security,” she said. “As it stood before, there were a few programs, such as Interpol, that had a database system, but now we are looking at being more global in that aspect.”The system will allow countries

to develop their own models and utilize the resources and knowledge of other nations, the delegate from Spain said.The resolution faced some

criticism early on, but after some discussion, they were able to build consensus.“We worked really hard to try

to get a consensus so that we’d be working for all nation-states while also including the interests of ev-eryone,” the Spanish delegate said.The General Assembly also

worked on 15 amendments that will seek to acknowledge the correlation between non-state ac-tors, the illicit weapons trade and groups that are affected by that trade, she said. Not all of these amendments passed. The General Assembly Plenary

Committee also passed a resolu-tion Friday morning that focused on international cooperation on humanitarian assistance for natural disasters.The resolution emphasized the

importance of non-governmental organizations, requested annual reports on disaster

byNEW YORK TIMES

ARMS , 2A

2A l Friday, February 12, 2016 l MMUN World News & Report

Peace talks in works for Syria, Turkey

Syria and Turkey agreed on peace terms about 15 hours after a mili-tary crisis stemming from an ISIS attack on Turkish soldiers put the two countries at odds.ISIS militants fired mortar shells

Friday morning across the Syrian-Turkish border, killing eight Turk-ish soldiers, according to reports is-sued to the Security Council North just hours after the incident. The attack triggered a response

from the Turkish government that included ground troops, tanks and air support being sent across the Syrian border, a move that led to the capture of a Turkish pilot by ISIS. Jordanian airstrikes halted the

advance of Turkish troops into the interior of Syria.The resolution reached Friday

afternoon proposes a peace summit to be located in Amman, Jordan, within the 30 days, a solution designed to protect the national sov-ereignty of both Syria and Turkey.Syrian Foreign Minister Walid

Muallem told the council that the maintenance of his country’s sover-eignty was a primary concern.“Syria firmly adheres to the idea

that the peace talks do need to include some sort of mutual assur-ance on both Syria and Turkey’s part,” Muallem said. “Tensions have been strained for so long, and it is the opinion of Syria that re-gaining those ties with one another is imperative.”The United States delegate also

offered the assistance of FBI agents and resources to help Turkey coun-ter the ISIS threat. The FBI agen-cies will work closely with Turkish officials to seek out terrorist cells.“We just want to make sure that

the final resolution addresses coun-tering ISIS, so that we will not have any similar situations in the fu-ture,” Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs Mevlut Cavusoglu said.The delegate from the United

Kingdom also reinforced the coun-cil’s opposition to ISIS.“Countering ISIS is an impor-

tant issue for the Security Council North,” the delegate said. “We openly condemn the actions that ISIS has taken in the Middle East.”

A single clause in a resolution concerned many delegations in the Economic and Social Council ple-nary committee Friday morning. The clause was part of a paper

drafted in the Commission on Narcotic Drugs that dealt with the demand of narcotic drugs and psy-chotropic substances and that was ultimately passed Friday morning. The resolution, which aimed

to combat the production and use of narcotic drugs, included an operative clause that vari-

byAL-JAZEERA

byCNN

ARMS: Sovereignty raises some concernspreparedness and proposed the increased transfer of technology assistance. The approved resolution also

placed a special emphasis on na-tional sovereignty, according to the delegate from Cuba. “The whole idea of the resolution

was ensuring that all of our actions make everything more efficient, more effective and really help the people that were at the center of

the response to natural disasters,” the delegate from Mexico said.But the delegate from Yemen

thought that the resolution did not go far enough. “Yemen and a small bloc of coun-

tries, however, did feel that, when it came to the subject of medi-cal care, certain things were not addressed in the way that Yemen would like,” the Yemeni delegate said.

ous delegations wanted out of the resolution that they otherwise agreed with. The clause “recommends the

Security Council apply economic sanctions to those states or entities found in non-compliance with or to be undermining the afore-mentioned recommended plan of action.”States who harbored drug lords

and entities involved in the drug trade would have sanctions imposed on them by the Security Coun-cil, the Commission on Narcotic Drugs delegate from Pakistan said.

arctic continent. Now the treaty includes more than fifty countries.With the situation escalating, the

Australian government decided to close the borders of its Ant-arctic territory as a precautionary measure, but the move trapped 37 Russian researchers within, leading the Russian government to demand the freedom of its scientists.“Our only goal is to retrieve those

scientists trapped in the Australian territory through diplomacy,” the delegate from Russia said.The Australian government

did not formally respond to that request, but a representative from the country was called into the Security Council meeting.“The Russian scientists that were

caught within our borders are being held as safety precautions,” Australian Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove said.A video of one of the Russian

scientists, Petrologist Rasputin Orlov, being held in the Australian The Security Council South considered redividing some Antarctic territory fol-

lowing a dispute over a newly discovered oil field.

Anti-drug proposal includes controversial sanctions

OIL FIELD: Australia says border closure done as precautionterritory soon surfaced in which he said they were barricaded inside and said he feared they would be killed.“Everything the Australian

government has told you is a lie,” Orlov said in the video. “We are being kept here against our will. We cannot conduct research. They have intercepted all communica-tions. I was only able to hack the mainframe for so long.”The French government also

closed its Antarctic borders, but the French delegate in the council condemned the actions of Austra-lia saying that they were holding hostages.The delegate from the U.S. ques-

tioned France on its haste closing its borders saying that if France reopened its borders, then the Australians would follow suit.“The United States stands with

Australia, we feel that the Aus-tralian government is acting well

within their right to protect their land,” the U.S. delegate said.Talks continued into the late

hours with solutions, including a full evacuation of the continent and dividing up the territory in a way as to meet American and Chinese territorial claims while punishing the Australians by taking some of their land.

After the peaceful extraction of 37 trapped Russian scientists Thursday night, conversation in the Security Council South turned to the division of Antarctica and whether the body should respond to Chile’s effort to unilaterally claim some of the land.Chile wasn’t the only country

to try to assume ownership of a stretch of previously unclaimed Antarctic territory. The United States and China had both laid claim to the area in the wake of a large oil field being discovered there.The moves called into question

the status of the Antarctic treaty that divvies up the continent.“When the United States

expressed its interest in Antarc-tica, we had the notion that these claims were well within our right,” the delegate said.The council brought in Manuela

Reinke, a specialist on the Ant-arctic treaty, who validated the U.S.’s assertion that due to a clause included when the U.S. as wellas Russia ratified the treaty they reserved the right to make such claims.Reinke went on to refute the

Chinese by referring to the treaty’s

byBBC

The delegate from New Zealand asks a question about the Antarctic treaty that divvies up the continent during an emer-gency meeting of the Security Council South.

Russian scientists peacefully released

clause that prohibits any new as-sertions and claims of land on the continent. All of the land claims, though,

faced criticism from some del-egates.“Lithuania sees these land claims

as a power grab between two major powers,” he said. “They are using their veto power as a way to push economic policies they want to see in Antarctica.”Even though the delegate from

France recognized the intentions of

the other major powers, she main-tained France’s support for peaceful negotiations, “The situation at hand was

threatening,” the delegate. “The de-escalation of said situation is the most ideal at this time.”Another question that remained

was whether Chileviolated the parameters of the treaty.“Chile is concerned with any

language that would condemn the research that has been done and maintains that the finding of oil

was on accident,” its delegate said. “We would like to see an immedi-ate action where we know that the Chinese military will not confront the Chilean military.”Both the delegates from France

and the U.S. backed Chile’s claim of innocence.The U.S. delegate added that the

attempt to punish Chile is an effort to disrupt attention from the real issues that came from the crisis, specifically China’s push into the area and the closing of borders.

Many delegations did not agree with the implications of the clause.The Forum on Indigenous

Issues delegate from Argentina pointed to sanctions possibly being levied against some nations that would be unable to meet the action plan laid out in the resolu-tion.“It would be unfair to impose

economic sanctions on states that wouldn’t be able to afford a plan that they didn’t sign on to in the beginning,” the Argentinian del-egate said.

However, the delegate from Gua-temala noted that the resolution was just a proposed idea and that another committee would have to figure out the details of how the sanctions would be defined and implemented. The delegate also said the resolu-

tion could be amended if delega-tions disagreed with the individual clause.“We wrote it in a way where

the resolution could still stand if people decided that we don’t want to suggest this,” the Guatemalan delegate said.