CETO Site Vote- Seitch

[DaveIronside]

The following application is open for debate and vote.

APPLICATION TO HAVE SEITCH RECOGNISED AS AN INTERNATIONALLY IMPORTANT SITE

I am writing to the scholars of the Cultural Exchange Treaty Organisation in order to request them to recognise the city of Seitch as an internationally significant site.

The city sits on the edge of the desert of Kaitaine in the far west of the nation. It is significant for four main reasons.

1. It is thought to be the only still inhabited city in the world which features high rise constructions made out of mud bricks.

2. It is home to the Palace of the Corrino family a ritual centre for the Bene Gesserit faith.

3. It is the only place in the world where the spice Melange, vital to the Bene Gesserit faith rituals, is produced.

4. It is considered the birth place of the Bene Gesserit faith.

In order to convince the respected scholars of this organisation please allow me to outline each reason in turn.

Built in the early 3rd Century AD the city is made out of a mixture of mud bricks and a limited amount of sandstone. While the vast majority of the buildings today date from the 16th Century they still use a largely traditional construction method. The city is contained within a 3 meter high wall which is made in the same manner of the buildings. It is believed that the city may feature some of the first "skyscrapers" as some of the largest buidlings have 12-15 floors, each floor contains four appartments. Not only does the construction method make the city rather unique the windows are often decorated with religious scripts from the Bene Gesserit faith. A large number of the appartments also contain balconies. Each block also contains a garden roof something that was thought important as the city sat on the edge of the desert agricultural land was at a minimum. Most of the blocks also contain significant underground constrcutions which in many cases have today become further living accomodation, shops or recreational facilities.

The city features a trademark narrow street, something that has prevented cars from entering the city and most commerce still relies on using porters to move goods through the city or convoys of donkeys. A handful of motorbike and mopeds do make their way through the streets though however these are not a common daily occurance. The city also see's an annual season where buildings are recovered in new layers of mud to ensure they stay in good condition throughout the year ahead. This has lead to the Festival of Mud whene the community take pride in coating the buildings while celebrating the cities existance.

Overlooking the city of Seitch from a rocky outcrop is the Corrino Palace, sometimes called the Palace of the Sands. It is the ancestoral home of the Corrino family who were made the guardians of the city of Seitch in the 12th Century. The family were considered to be among the most holy families by the Bene Gesserit faith and as such given dominion of the desert which features significantly in the faith's folklore. Additionally it gave them a unique status in the faith as the Palace is the place where the new harvest of the ritual spice Melange is blessed, not a single shipment of the spice may leave Seitch without passing through the Palace. The Palace itself is also a fort and was built to provide an additionally refuge for the people of Seitch in times of crisis. The Palace is today the official residence of Duke Niklaus Corrino.

The city of Seitch is also home to hundreds of what are called Spice Farms. These are large recessed stone tanks filled with sand and home to in same case hundreds of Kaitaine Sandworms, a unique species of sand dwelling worm. Every year the worms grow and shed their skin which is collected and ground up to make the red spice Melange which is a central part of the Bene Gesserit faith. Bene Gesserit folklore talks of how at one time their ancestors harvest the spice directly from the desert when the worms would grow up to 40 meters in circumfrance and some 400 meters long. Today however the worms grow no more than 30 centremeters long. Every year the tanks are emptied and the shed skins collected and ground up. Many small tradesman still use traditional methods where the work is done by hand, first by shovelling the sand out and sieving the sands to find the living worms, remove the deceased ones and most importantly find the shed skins. The Spice farm is the refilled with sand and the living worms replaced. In recent times however more modern Spice Farms have been built with devices built in allowing sand to drain out through a kind of filter which captures the worms and shed skins. It is believed that over two tons of spice is farmed in an average year. No spice is permitted to be used until blessed by the Sisterhood.

One of the key aspects of the Bene Gesserit folklore is that all four Holy Houses descend from an individual called Selim Wormrider. It is he who is thought to have established the first rules of the Bene Gesserit faith and was the first to discover the spiritual power of the spice Melange. Stories tell how Selim was outcast from his tribe and made to walk into the desert where the giant sandworms would consume him. He was gone for several years and naturally presumed dead until one day he returned for vengence against those who had sent him to the desert to die. Stories tell of how he had summound the largest of Sandworms known as Shai Halud, the creature thought to carry the dead to what lies beyond. The worm consumed those that had exiled him and left him alone on a rocky outcrop at the edge of the desert. It was here other tribes having seen the tracks of the giant sandworm found him meditating and where he established the beginnings of the Bene Gesserit faith. As such the city is today seen as the most holy place for the Bene Gesserit and therefore makes the city not just important to the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood, its followers but also to the world as the Bene Gesserit faith today has crept into every corner of Mundus.

It is our hope therefore that this application will be accepted by the members of the Cultural Exchange Treaty Organisation and that Seitch may be entered onto the register of protected sites.

Questions may be asked or debate held until Wednesday 3rd July 2019. After which voting shall open.

[DaveIronside]

Voting is open until Sunday 8pm UK Time.

Seitch requires 3/4 of the votes cast to be admitted.

[DaveIronside]

East Moreland votes no.
Royal Seleucid votes yes

[Libby]

Lodja Votes No
Theocracy of Kaitaine votes Yes

[The Young Pope]

Krimeon votes no

[KrisNord]

UC votes Yes
NA votes Yes

[Xaeth]

The Most Serene and Celestial Empire of Xæth votes "Yes".

[Beatrice]

The First Empire of Rokkenjima votes no.

[Achkaerin]

The relevant article for the admission of a site of international is found at article 7(i) in the Cultural Exchange Treaty and states:

A register of sites which are of interest to more than one nation. The process for admission onto this register shall be as follows. Applications will be made by the government of the nation in which the site is located. Applications to be on this register will be submitted to the panel described in Article 8. A simple 3/4 majority of scholars from treaty signatory nations will enrol sites onto the register.

This throws up two key questions that we as members must satisfy firstly there is the legal question over territory - do we consider that the Theocracy of Kaitaine is itself a nation? There is no international coherence on this point we have some nations that say that the Theocracy is a nation and we have others that say they are not, the majority of nations have not taken a position publicly on this. However whether we agree with the classification of the Theocracy as a nation or not we must accept that they were admitted into this organisation in good order in that the admission process was adhered to and the Theocracy admitted by receipt of the endorsements from Arda Tuluva and Quintelia. Ultimately this is an issue for the lawyers but it does seem that the way the treaty is constructed does not cover all the bases in this regard and it is perhaps something that the membership should examine, perhaps at its next annual conference.

However the Theocracy was admitted and is therefore considered a member of this organisation and as such they have the right to make a submission under article seven. The submission itself details clearly the reasons why the site is of historical significance to the followers of a belief it also, critically, states that the Bene Gesserit have communities across Mundus, I don't believe any member of this organisation would dispute this point as the existence of the Chapterhouse schools in different nations outside of Kaitaine supports this point. So we could say, from that point of view, that the site is of interest to more than one nation due to there being many communities of the Bene Gesserit across Mundus. If we say this is correct then it follows that Seitch meets the criteria for admission onto the register. However this would then depend on whether the city is deemed in a legal sense to be under the sovereignty of the Theocracy thereby returning us to the legal question.

Ultimately the Holy Empire of Achkaerin is satisfied that the historical criteria is met. The legal question is murkier because it depends on whether the McPherson led Government of Kaitaine is viewed as the legitimate government or as an occupying force, in the case of the latter this would mean the Bene Gesserit to be the legitimate government and would then mean that the Theocracy is a legitimate state. Achkaerin does not presently have an established position on the matter of the Theocracy (it is presently in the consultative process in the government system)

Therefore Achkaerin abstains on this vote.

[Achkaerin]

OOC - for reference current membership of the CETO in terms on the map nations is by count 16 (Haalgland and Huisslandia appear on the membership list but not the regional map) currently with 4 votes against and a single abstention I believe that the Theocracy requires either 10 or 11 to vote for it depending on whether we round up or down (as 3/4 of 15 is 10.75 and an abstention is a decision not to vote)

[Major Jaws]

Quintelia votes yes

[Major Jaws]

Pardclinnia votes yes

[Achkaerin]

I note that we're well past the deadline and of the eleven votes cast Seitch has achieved 7 putting it short of the 75% (8/11) so I therefore believe that Seitch would not be added to the register.