diplomats-of-sweden

"The car stopped and a general in a magnificent uniform stepped out; he was wearing a monocle and his chest was covered with decorations. He was a most corpulent man, strong-looking with wide shoulders, extremely stiff in manner, imposing, and what seemed to me a terribly Prussian appearance. The expression on his face was hard, his lips tight, his gestures frigid. I kept myself modestly to one side, watching this character and thinking to myself that it would not be easy to deal with him."

"It is … undeniable that no settlement can be just and complete if recognition is not accorded to the right of the Arab refugee to return to the home from which he has been dislodged by the hazards and strategy of the armed conflict between Arabs and Jews in Palestine. The majority of these refugees have come from territory which … was to be included in the . The exodus of Palestinian Arabs resulted from panic created by fighting in their communities, by rumours concerning real or alleged acts of terrorism, or expulsion. It would be an offence against the principles of elemental justice if these innocent victims of the conflict were denied the right to return to their homes while Jewish immigrants flow into Palestine, and, indeed, at least offer the threat of permanent replacement of the Arab refugees who have been rooted in the land for centuries."

"I have my detractors in Washington. There are bastards who spread things around, of course, who planted nasty things in the media."

"… there are people in this administration who say they don't care if the UN sinks under the East river, and other crude things…"

"It's true the Iraqis misbehaved and had no credibility but that doesn't necessarily mean that they were in the wrong."

"But in the Middle Ages people were convinced there were witches. They looked for them and they certainly found them."

"It was to do with information management. The intention was to dramatise it."

"But tarring the Blix-led inspection mission ranked as a high priority for war enthusiasts on the Bush team who were eager to pressure Blix into becoming more confrontational with the Iraqi government and perhaps to lay groundwork for discounting his future reports to the Security Council. Key rightwing media voices were warbling from the same songbook. “We hope that as the days unfold Mr. Blix understands that his own credibility is as much on the line as Saddam Hussein’s,” the Wall Street Journal editorialized on November 22, adding darkly that “Mr. Blix has his own track record in Iraq, and it doesn’t inspire confidence that he will go to the mat to disarm the dictator. The question now is whether the seventy-four-year-old Swedish diplomat is going to let Saddam make a fool of him and the U.N. one more time.” The Journal’s editorial page, often the source of opening salvos that quickly resound in the national media echo chamber, was just getting started. Two editions later, a long top-of-thepage attack appeared under the headline “Hans the Timid.” As if to be graphic about Blix’s dubious character, the drawing that accompanied the op-ed article showed him wearing a tie with a peace sign on it"

"Personally, Mr. Blix is amiable and has a sense of humor; politically he is weak and easily fooled. I can think of few European officials less suitable for a showdown with Saddam. Indeed, it is with utter disbelief that I watch television news about Mr. Blix's negotiations with the Iraqi dictator's henchmen. [...] Regardless of how this crisis develops from this point, the United Nations has neglected its duties by asking a wimp to lead the inspectors who are supposed to stand up to the brute of Baghdad."

"He's as reliable as a Volvo."

"There was a very consistent creation of a virtual reality, and eventually it collided with our old-fashioned, ordinary reality."

"I found it peculiar that those who wanted to take military action could — with 100 per cent certainty — know that the weapons existed and turn out to have zero knowledge of where they were."

"The Assembly has witnessed over the last weeks how historical truth is established; once an allegation has been repeated a few times, it is no longer an allegation, it is an established fact, even if no evidence has been brought out in order to support it."

"Setbacks in trying to realize the ideal do not prove that the ideal is at fault."

"It is when we all play safe that we create a world of utmost insecurity. It is when we all play safe that fatality will lead us to our doom. It is in the "dark shade of courage" alone that the spell can be broken."

"The breaking wave and the muscle as it contracts obey the same law. Delicate line gathers the body's total strength in a bold balance. Shall my soul meet so severe a curve, journeying on its way to form?"

"It is a little bit humiliating when I have to say that Chou En-lai to me appears as the most superior brain I have so far met in the field of foreign politics...[He is] so much more dangerous than you imagine because he is so much better a man than you have ever admitted."

"The big, shoe-thumping fellow continues as a dark thunderhead to threaten all unrepentant non-Communists with hail and thunder."

"Friendship needs no words — it is solitude delivered from the anguish of loneliness."

"Life only demands from you the strength you possess. Only one feat is possible — not to have run away."

"Life yields only to the conqueror. Never accept what can be gained by giving in. You will be living off stolen goods, and your muscles will atrophy."

"Never look down to test the ground before taking your next step; only he who keeps his eye fixed on the far horizon will find his right road."

"Mät aldrig bergets höjd förrän du nått toppen. Då skall du se hur lågt det var."

"Your cravings as a human animal do not become a prayer just because it is God whom you ask to attend to them."

"God does not die on the day when we cease to believe in a personal deity, but we die on the day when our lives cease to be illumined by the steady radiance, renewed daily, of a wonder, the source of which is beyond all reason."

"The longest journey Is the journey inwards. Of him who has chosen his destiny, Who has started upon his quest For the source of his being."

"Time goes by: reputation increases, ability declines."

"We are not permitted to choose the frame of our destiny. But what we put into it is ours."

"Är livet fattigt? Är icke snarare din hand för smal, dina ögonlinser grumlade? Det är du som måste växa."

"There is a point at which everything becomes simple and there is no longer any question of choice, because all you have staked will be lost if you look back. Life's point of no return."

"Never, "for the sake of peace and quiet," deny your own experience or convictions."

"Bed att din ensamhet blir sporren att finna något att leva för, stort nog att dö för."

"Jag kämpar för det omöjliga: att mitt liv skall få en mening. Jag vågar inte, vet inte hur jag skulle kunna tro: att jag inte är ensam."

"What makes loneliness an anguish Is not that I have no one to share my burden, But this: I have only my own burden to bear."

"It is easy to be nice, even to an enemy — from lack of character."

"For all that has been — Thanks! To all that shall be — Yes!"

"Att vara fri, att kunna stå upp och lämna allt — utan att se sig tillbaka. Att säga ja —"

"He who has surrendered himself to it knows that the Way ends on the Cross — even when it is leading him through the jubilation of Gennesaret or the triumphal entry into Jerusalem."

"Maturity: among other things, the unclouded happiness of the child at play, who takes it for granted that he is at one with his play-mates."

"Give me a pure heart — that I may see Thee. A humble heart — that I may hear Thee, A heart of love — that I may serve Thee, A heart of faith — that I may abide in Thee."

"Godhet är något så enkelt: att alltid finnas för andra, att aldrig söka sig själv."

"The only kind of dignity which is genuine is that which is not diminished by the indifference of others."

"A task becomes a duty from the moment you suspect it to be an essential part of that integrity which alone entitles a man to assume responsibility."

"Respect for the word is the first commandment in the discipline by which a man can be educated to maturity — intellectual, emotional, and moral. Respect for the word — to employ it with scrupulous care and in incorruptible heartfelt love of truth — is essential if there is to be any growth in a society or in the human race. To misuse the word is to show contempt for man. It undermines the bridges and poisons the wells. It causes Man to regress down the long path of his evolution. "But I say unto you, that every idle word that men speak...""

"Le courage de nos différences. Without becoming irresponsible, to accept what divides us — with humility and with pride. It is by the 'new' that mankind is saved or betrayed."

"In our era, the road to holiness necessarily passes through the world of action."

"Forgiveness is the answer to the child's dream of a miracle by which what is broken is made whole again, what is soiled is again made clean."

"To love life and men as God loves them — for the sake of their infinite possibilities, to wait like Him, to judge like Him, without passing judgment, to obey the order when it is given and never look back — Then He can use you — then, perhaps, He will use you."

"I believe that we should die with decency so that at least decency will survive."

"Destiny is something not be to desired and not to be avoided...it is a mystery not contrary to reason, for it implies that the world, and the course of human history, have meaning."