Nothing
to write home about the UN (October 27)
By Jatra Mairembam
Millennium's
crudest joke came from the Norwegian Nobel Committee in the form of
an award. As the US Stealth Bombers pounded Kabul and Kandahar, the
Nobel Committee rushed in to award world's most prestigious prize,
the Nobel Peace prize to UN and its Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
The prize was given for working for a better-organized and more
peaceful world in tackling challenges from poverty to terrorism. The
irony is that the peace prize came at a time when the role of UN as
a global peacekeeper, has been decimated and the world body has
turned into a mute spectator.
The balance of power prevalent after World War II has been radically
transformed with the end of the cold war. But the United Nations
continues to reflect the immediate post-war political realities. Its
Security Council has five permanent members who exercise the veto
power. Of the five, US, Russia, France and UK have been the founder
members of the council. China was included many years later. The
inclusion of the first four is easily explained, as they were the
victors in World War 11.
The incorporation of China was recognition of a changing world and
of China's emergence as a major player in global politics. But
profound changes have occurred, since then in the global scenario.
UK no longer is a world power. It depends everything from foreign
policy to economies on US. Russia is nowhere in the scene. Two
countries, Germany and Japan, who we're on the losing side in the
war emerged as key players. America becomes the undisputed- super
power.
The United Nations fails to mirror this shift in world affairs. The
role of the UN seems to have been overshadowed by economic and
military might of the US and often the UN portrays itself as a
mouthpiece of USA. Today, the UNO has been reduced to a world body
engaging only in passing resolutions and holding expensive
conferences. When it was formed in 1945, its primary objective was
to ensure world peace. The question on the success of the UN needs
certain, amount of introspection and retrospection.
A trip down the memory lane reveals a grim picture of UN in peace
efforts. The marathon war between Iran and Iraq proved to be an acid
test for UN. The then Secretary-General, Javier Perez De Cuellar
went on a four day UN peace mission to the two warring nations.
Cuellar had undertaken the trip in an attempt to secure compliance
by Iraq for July 20 1987 UN Security Council resolution number 598.
The UN failed to make any breakthrough to break the deadlock.
In the ongoing decades old Palestine-Israel, conflict, the UN took a
tough stand in taking Israel to task for gross violation of human
rights in occupied territories. But UN policy suffered a setback
when America vetoed on February 2, 1988 a resolution on the occupied
territories. The vote was 14 to 1, which showed that while the
international community favored, action against Israel, the US did
not.
Besides, there have been many significant failures of UN in Somalia,
Haiti and Bosnia. The UN was helpless then US, Britain and France
supported South Africa Government in the Namibian crisis. In Rwanda
and Angola, UN became a silent spectator rather than preventor of
brutality. During the Gulf war, it only provided a pinch of
legitimacy to the US military actions.
The UN has been conspicuously absent in, the MidEast imbroglio. Even
in the ongoing US military operations in Afghanistan, the UN prefers
to stay backstage except issuing sore notes on the dead of four of
its workers. For an effective solutions to inter-State and
intra-State conflicts, the idea of a permanent UN armed forces has
been mooted several times. As the UN Secretary-General, has
repeatedly pointed out, if the UN is to be an important force for
peace in the post cold war years, the member States must be more
willing to provide money and armed forces to enable the world body
to undertake important new roles in pursuance of peace.
But numerous factors have come as a stumbling block to this idea. In
some peacekeeping operations, the moral behavior of the peacekeepers
became questionable as it was in the case of Somalia. Peacekeepers
themselves became killers. Their experience was rather sad and
discouraging. Added to this, was the disapproval of many nations,
including India on preventive, deployment of UN peacekeeping forces
on request from one State.
But the most important objection against the proposal of a permanent
UN force is financial. We may recall that the US which had been the
biggest contributor of UN funds (one-fourth of the UN's then annual
budget of 825 million dollars) threatened to cut its share from 210
million dollars to 100 million dollars in 1987.
Another proof of this problem was the exercise of the veto in
Security Council on 11 May 1993 by Russia for the first time in the
post cold war period. The veto blocked a Minor British resolution
aimed at restricting the financing of the UN peacekeeping operations
in Cyprus. Russia was in serious economic difficulties and even a
contribution of 2 million dollars, which Britain sought from Russia,
was described as too much. Likewise financial conditions of other
third world countries are in a deplorable state too. This crippled
many UN peace operations. Today, the domination of UN by US is
somewhat total and a layman will find hard to distinguish between UN
and US. This synonymity has provoked many nations.
On November 12, 1996, the US suffered a decisive defeat in the UN
when the General Assembly asked it to end the tough unilateral
economic sanctions against Cuba. The anger against Washington was
visible as 137 members voted in favor of the resolution. Some
countries voted for the resolution because they were annoyed over
Washington's attempt to impose its own laws on them. Among them were
the remaining four permanent members of Security Council.
Apparently, the Helms-Burton Act, which aimed at penalizing foreign
firms trading with Cuba, provoked most countries to adopt the
anti-US stance.
The United Nations should be the only source of legitimacy a global
military action can command. If certain developments, like US
operations against Iraq, Taliban or French intervention in Rwanda
are allowed to continue unabated, the blue flag of the UN will
become recognized as a fig leaf for military activities of any power
which can muster a Security Council vote.
In the present, Afghan context, while the UN distances itself from
the trouble terrain, President Bush has poignantly exhibited its
diplomatic finesse. He has transformed America's war to global war
on terrorism. The United Nations has so far succeeded in averting a
third world war but intra-State, conflicts continue to plague the
globe.
The UN should wake up to its international responsibilities and
restructure itself to become a responsible world body free from the
shackles of super power's hegemony. When Kofi Annan heard the news
of Nobel Peace prize being conferred oar him and UN, he admitted
that it was a great encouragement. Indeed Annan, the world expects
the UN to be the sole body of all nations and work for everlasting
peace in a world determined by Bin, Bush and Blair.
(Courtesy: The Sangai Express)
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