As some of you may know, we intend to arrange a large-scale Model UN conference in April. Well, today our website is finally online which means we can start recruiting delegates. We hope to get as many delegates as possible – we will be operating with an upper limit of around 70 people, from Aberystwyth as well as the rest of the UK.
The conference is set to be unlike anything this society has ever done before. This will be a truly impressive Model UN, and we are in the process of securing keynote speakers for the conference. It will be arranged on the weekend of 11-13 April, the opening ceremony on Friday night and committees in session Saturday and Sunday. I would encourage you all to attend the conference, and I promise that this will be an event to remember. I would also appreciate it if you help spread the word by talking to friends who might be interested, especially those who are interested in international politics or have enjoyed (or missed out on) the InterPol dept crisis games.

For now, you can check out the website at www.abermun.org, or you can join our official Facebook group for conference-specific news and updates http://aber.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6202184798. If there are any questions feel free to ask me or any of the committee members, or send us an email at abermun@googlemail.com

If you would like to register immediately, you can do so by sending an email to abermun@googlemail.com (the registration form on the website is currently down due to technical issues).

Read on for more information about the event.

The conference will start on Saturday 1 December at 13:00 in the Library Seminar Room, Hugh Owen, where we will convene as the Human Rights Council to discuss Human Rights in Israel and Palestine. Enclosed in your emails is a study guide from OXIMUN 2006, which also deals with Darfur – note that we will only be dealing with Israel and Palestine, so you can disregard the second part of the study guide. If you are not on our mailing list and would like a copy, please send us an email asking for one. The guide is quite extensive and you are not expected to read it all, but if you are interested then it might prove a very useful insight into the situation. Also keep in mind that it was produced in 2006 – and may be out of date on certain areas.

We will commit a bit of a faux pas by pretending that Israel is in the HRC, and also give observer rights to the PLO. Make your country reservations by adding a comment here, sending us an email, or writing on the wall of our Facebook event.

After we pass a resolution we’ll be going down to Weatherspoon’s to have dinner and then move on to pubs around town and have a blast.

Below are a few links you might find useful in your research, if you wish to do more (or something else) than the study guide:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Rights_Council#Council.27s_position_on_Israel
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli-Palestinian_conflict
http://www.globalissues.org/Geopolitics/MiddleEast/Palestine.asp
http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE150672007?open&of=ENG-ISR

As mentioned, try to bring along as many people who might be interested. We’re going to maintain a friendly atmosphere throughout the debate, though I still hope the debate between Israel and its Arab neighbours will be heated.

On the upcoming Sunday, we will be arranging a one day mini-conference and social. It will take place in the Library Seminar Room, our usual meeting place. Read on for more information about the conference.

The agenda will be automatically set at 13:30 on Sunday the 4th to discuss the topic of Child Soldiers. However, if you are new, or are feeling rusty, senior members of the society will be present already at 13:00 and will give a presentation on the Model UN format of debating, if participants desire. This will also include a briefing on and copy of the unique Aberystwyth MUN Society Rules of Procedure, which you are expected to follow at all times. A briefing paper from last year’s Cambridge MUN on the issue can be attained here and will come in handy for the research. Nations can be reserved either in the comment section below or by email to one of the committe members. We will not set an end time to the conference, but instead concluding the debate when we feel it is appropriate.

After the debate, we will be moving down to Weatherspoon’s for a meal followed perhaps by a few pubs in town later that night, or maybe even the pub quiz in Scholars. The details will be settled on Sunday.

This will be a very useful exercise for those of you who are going to LIMUN (even though LIMUN is still far ahead), so I hope to see as many as possible! In fact, the more the merrier. Last time was a lot of fun and I hope we can build on that success and have as much fun this time around as well.

The Secretary-General is pleased to announce that the first Aber mini-conference of the 07/08 academic year will take place this weekend. A booking of the Library Seminar Room (same place as usual) has been confirmed from 13:30 to 17:30 on the upcoming Saturday, i.e. the 6th. Please read on for further information.
The agenda for the conference is vague at this point in time as the planning has yet to be completed – however we have decided to split the day into two separate parts. The first part will be a training workshop, lasting for about 20-30% of our total time, where we will introduce newcomers to the proceedings of a Model UN simulation in greater detail than on Monday, as well as to introduce veterans to the Aber MUN rules, which we will adopt in each session, beginning next week. The second part will be a conference, albeit on a larger scale than the usual two-hour sessions.

For the conference, the topic has been set to Agricultural Tariffs. This because there has been a request to do economic topics related to developing countries (in our forums), so if you would like a saying in the choosing of our topics, then registers there and start discussing. At first glance this may sound like a dry and technical topic, but having personally discussed this topic at CUIMUN 2007, I can guarantee you that this is an excellent topic, which may provide many heated arguments between developing and developed countries. Enclosed in the email you should have received is a briefing paper which will prove very helpful as a starting point in your research. Since it proved a complete failure for us to do country-specific research for you in the last session, we hope that you will do this on your own. Please remember that you may reserve a country either at our website or forums – you are not guaranteed your first choice if you do not do so. This time we would also like you to write your own resolution, and although this may sound daunting to some of the new members, I assure you that it is not as hard as it sounds, and we will also continue this topic next Monday to help give you sufficient time.

After the schedule is over, we hope to drag as many people as possible down to Weatherspoons, where food will be consumed and maybe some awards will be handed out.
Members are encouraged to reserve a country prior to the conference – this can be done here in the comment fields (no registration required, in our message boards, or by sending an email to me (sim6).

Snorri
Sec-Gen