Canada on Ice: at the UN
By Ian Williams, October 26, 2010
Canada’s defeat in elections for a temporary seat in the UN Security Council has implications that reach beyond being an upset for Stephen Harper’s conservative government in Ottawa. It reinforces how far most UN members are from supporting other nations that unconditionally accept Israeli behavior in the Middle East. It also, ironically, lends some support to Ottawa’s longstanding opposition to increasing the number of permanent Security Council members.
In a secret ballot election in early October, UN General Assembly members cast votes for which nations would fill the non-permanent seats on the Security Council for the next two years. While the Asian, African, and Latin American seats were uncontested, the two seats for the Western European and Other group (which includes Canada) were up for grabs. Germany won the ballot outright. In the second round, Canada lost to Portugal, 78 to 113. This rout should have been a wakeup call for the Canadian electorate. Sadly, it is unlikely to disturb the isolationist reveries of Stephen Harper and his right-wing Canadian government.
Indeed, some Canadian diplomats quietly suggest that Harper and company scarcely noticed the Security Council candidacy was coming up for a vote until the last moment. They then did little or nothing to prepare for it and seemed insouciant of how conservative policies had tarnished the country’s once golden reputation. This reflects the isolationism of the party’s domestic base.
The defeat has implications extending beyond Canadian discomfort. Discussions have been underway for reforming the Security Council, including increasing the number of permanent and non-permanent members. In January, five of the countries aspiring to these new permanent seats will be sitting as elected members. Germany, India, and South Africa were elected this year to join already sitting Brazil and Nigeria among the putative permanent members. Canada, which opposes adding new permanent seats, will not be at the table even in a temporary capacity.
Losing Status
Although the rather arrogant Harper government did not expect this outcome, more objective observers inside and outside of Canada were not surprised. It was only one more sign that the shelf life was expiring on the prestige accumulated by previous governments.
Since the beginning of the UN, Canada has been up there with Sweden as the very model of a modern UN member and has been almost automatically elected to any position in the organization. This is not just because Canadians were polite or that the Mounties had nice red uniforms. It was based on an independence of spirit that could happily defy London and, more importantly, Washington on issues of principle and international law. With the traditional social-democratic and liberal attitudes of much of the Canadian electorate, Harper’s government has not been able to live up to its conservative aspirations at home. But since the executive branch has more unbridled influence over foreign policy, it has been able to overturn longstanding international attitudes.
In times past, Ottawa had defied its giant neighbor to establish relations with China and later maintained trade, travel and diplomatic links with Cuba. Before the Harper administration, Canada supported important pillars of international law, such as the international tribunals in Yugoslavia and Rwanda, and the International Criminal Court. It pioneered the articulation of the Responsibility to Protect, which established principles for genuine humanitarian intervention that avoided acting as a cover for aggression. It also led such important campaigns as the ban on land mines.
Then Stephen Harper and the new breed of rebarbative and reactionary Canadian conservatives took over. They began by emulating President George W. Bush at almost every level, and in some ways went further. Canada showed hostility to Russia and China, more on atavistic Cold War grounds than because of any deep concern for human rights, since Ottawa developed a U.S.-style expediency on that subject. Its troops in Afghanistan handed over prisoners to the CIA. Its officials did nothing at all about Canadian citizens that the United States kidnapped in New York and sent for torture in the Middle East or held in Guantanamo.
Harper’s Canada reversed 60 years of Canadian practice. The country that almost invented peacekeeping stopped contributing blue helmets to peacekeeping forces. The inherent isolationism of many conservatives was also reflected in the retrenchment of foreign missions and foreign aid.
Changes in Middle East Policy
Canada’s pre-Harper policies on the Middle East conflict, reflected on the official foreign ministry website, had been exemplary statements of international law and accepted UN decisions. As such, Canada refused to recognize the annexation of the territories, declared settlements to be illegal, and called for an independent Palestinian state.
Although the website has not changed, executive decisions have profoundly changed the interpretation of these policies. The government has withdrawn contributions to UNRWA, which feeds and educates Palestinian refugees. It defunded grants to NGOs that investigate Israeli human rights abuses as well as Arab Israeli human rights research. And whatever you think of the principle, what government with any sense of diplomacy signs a trade agreement with Israel days before asking for nonaligned votes?
There could be an expedient argument for kowtowing to a neighboring superpower, but Ottawa does not seem to have noticed the last election in the United States. In fairness to Canadian independence, Harper’s government was not so much emulating Bush as pandering to deep-rooted domestic conservatism and accommodating its own right-wing Israel lobby in the hope that traditionally Liberal constituencies with a large Jewish vote would switch to Harper’s Conservatives.
That at least partially explains why Harper continues to pander to Bushism even now Bush has gone. Harper’s about-face puts Ottawa out of step with Washington, at a time when the Obama administration has taken steps to reach out to Arab and Muslim countries despite denouncements by right-wing hawks that the United States is turning anti-Israel. Dragged to the right by the unforgiving Likud-inclined lobby, the Canadian government now acts as if Israel can do no wrong. In contrast with the usual abstentions of the EU when Israel is on the agenda, Canada has recently opposed any scrutiny of Israeli actions. For instance, it voted against the UN Human Rights Council even considering Operation Cast Lead.
Some in Canada’s Conservative government blamed Michael Ignatieff, the leader of the opposition, for the Security Council defeat, Earlier this fall, Ignatieff had questioned whether his nation should earn a seat given its failure to pay attention to the UN and its current foreign policy. Indeed, there is little opposition even from the Canadian opposition to the proposition that Israel is always right.
UN Reform Stalled
Ironically, the defeat of Canada vindicates a longstanding Canadian proposition that no additional permanent Security Council seats should be created. Rather, Canada has supported the creation of more elected seats with the option for renewable terms. Ironically, this eminently sensible proposal might also have cost Ottawa some support from would be permanent seat holders. In any case, maybe Ottawa’s defeat this time will send a message to other aspiring powers about the need to listen to their international colleagues.
Since the existing permanent five can veto any attempt to take away their veto - and frankly the United States, Russia, and China would probably quit the organization without it - the proposal does not compound the injustice by creating new permanent seats, let alone new permanent seats with vetoes. Rather, it ensures that Brazil, Egypt, Germany, India, Japan, Nigeria, or South Africa would have to truly reflect the views of their regions and the UN community to be re-elected.
In a way, the line-up of newly elected members is almost a dry run for such a Council. The United States and the rest of the Permanent Five will not likely be able to ignore non-permanent members who have serious power in the real world rather than simply power by virtue of their position in the Council.
Smaller members have also played significant roles when seated in the Council; Ireland, Jamaica, Mauritius, and others provided more consistent and less expedient opposition to the Iraq War than France. But a Security Council composed of seriously sized emerging powers, representing smaller members in their regions, could shift the global center of gravity away from the “G-Forces” the G8 and G20.
Canada’s defeat is a salutary lesson for nations -– and their leaders -- who ignore world opinion. Ignatieff’s fact-based assertion that the country simply did not deserve a Security Council seat under the Harper government demonstrates that the opposition is more in touch with the international order than the government.
The traditional pro-UN Canadian position can draw some comfort from the Canadian defeat, which points the way for genuine Security Council reform – ensuring that its members represent the world in ways more profound than bean-counting regional representation. No member of the Council should have impunity for their geopolitical behavior – as perhaps the Obama administration will soon discover when the UN tries to reconcile unilateral Palestinian declarations of statehood with unilateral and illegal settlement-building.
Ian Williams, senior analyst and long time contributor to FPIF, is a New York-based author and journalist. He is currently working on a new edition of his book, The UN For Beginners.
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Recommended Citation:
Ian Williams, "Canada on Ice: at the UN" (Washington, DC: Foreign Policy In Focus, October 26, 2010)
Showing posts with label Guardian Unlimited.. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Guardian Unlimited.. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Friday, September 26, 2008
Do As I Say, Not As I Do - Bush
Comment is free
Cif America
Paying lip service to multilateralism
George Bush's emphasis on international cooperation in his final UN speech is totally disconnected from his actions as president
All comments (50)
Ian Williams
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday September 23 2008 21:30 BST
Article history
George Bush's parting speech to the UN on Tuesday was a bit like a rapist deciding to whisper sweet nothings as he climbs up off his victim. Sadly, most of his victims sat sycophantically and applauded, even if they muttered behind their name placards.
Last year, Bush's UN speech script went to the press with all his phonetic spellings put in, lest he insult dear friends and allies by mispronouncing their names. For his curtain call at the world body, for someone used to autocues, he intoned a competent if uninspiring sermon to the assembled world leaders. And avoided tricky names.
Luckily, the world had low expectations of his first visit eight years ago, so it could keep its disappointment within limits when he lowered the bar. Since then Bush has started several wars, threatened several more and brought the global economy to the precipice, while leaving his ungrateful nation several trillion dollars in extra debts from the Iraq war and bailouts to financial institutions – not a mention a few extra billion to the guys who owned and ran those institutions. It was not the best of backdrops for a farewell performance.
Most of the sentiments in his speech would have been unexceptional, and the congregation would have nodded in agreement and off to doze, were it not for the total disconnect between the sentiments expressed and the behaviour of the preacher.
He preached: "As sovereign states, we have an obligation to govern responsibly and solve problems before they spill across borders. We have an obligation to prevent our territory from being used as a sanctuary for terrorism and proliferation and human trafficking and organised crime."
All true, but it would ring more so if did not come from the lips of someone whose government was "trafficking" humans in rendition flights across the globe, or even one who had not allowed bank lobbyists to craft the financial regime that now threatens to crash the global economy.
"No cause can justify the deliberate taking of innocent human life," he said, which is almost beyond comment, although I am sure some Iraqi, Afghan or Pakistani villagers could be found who would rise to the task, let alone Lebanese villagers or Gazans minced up by US-supplied munitions.
The brave talk at Annapolis has shrunk down to one terse reference to "the people of the Palestinian Territories, who deserve a free and peaceful state of their own." If the settlers backed by American money leave them any space or water for it.
Of course, one of Bush's problems is that by the time he came to realise the usefulness, and indeed the indispensability of working through the UN, he had made it difficult for anyone to take his overtures seriously. It was the road to Baghdad rather than the road to Damascus that saw his conversion. There he and his neocon advisers were, cock-a-hoop at their victory, and there was nothing they could do with it. They could not sell Iraqi oil, and any regime they installed would have zero legitimacy.
They brought in the UN, but even though the UN administration and the security council were forgiving and went along, they could not show gratitude. Sending John Bolton was the equivalent of putting King Herod in charge of Unicef, as the White House, now savaged almost weekly by Bolton's Parthian fusillades, may realise. It does not help that Bush happily echoed Bolton's flip denigrations of the institution, calling it "the wax museum", seemingly insouciant that if you want people to rally to a flag, even a blue one, it's best not to smear it with crap before and even while you are waving it.
"The objectives I've laid out for multilateral institutions - confronting terror, opposing tyranny and promoting effective development - are difficult, but they are necessary tasks," Bush said. Presumably unlike climate change, which got not a single mention, despite Ban Ki-moon, who had just spoken about it as the "defining issue of our era". Bush presumably has great expectations of a lucrative post-retirement career funded by big oil.
Even so, Bolton will now be even grumpier, since his once-unilateral president used the word "multilateral" no less than nine times in his speech. But as with his predecessor, Bill Clinton, Bush used it without the connotations of collegiality with which less powerful nations imbue it. "Do as I say, not as I do" was the constant subtext.
Above all Bush cherishes the illusion that for the billions of the world faced with climate change, pollution, mass repression and killing by governments, not to mention simple starvation, "terrorism" is the biggest threat. He returned to it over and over again – and it can't be for domestic reasons, since polls suggest that the American electorate have put it in it proper perspective.
But look on the bright side, Bolton will be peeved that the Axis of Evil is currently down to two, Syria and Iran, although Hugo Chávez and Raul Castro may feel self-righteously peeved at being left out.
Cif America
Paying lip service to multilateralism
George Bush's emphasis on international cooperation in his final UN speech is totally disconnected from his actions as president
All comments (50)
Ian Williams
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday September 23 2008 21:30 BST
Article history
George Bush's parting speech to the UN on Tuesday was a bit like a rapist deciding to whisper sweet nothings as he climbs up off his victim. Sadly, most of his victims sat sycophantically and applauded, even if they muttered behind their name placards.
Last year, Bush's UN speech script went to the press with all his phonetic spellings put in, lest he insult dear friends and allies by mispronouncing their names. For his curtain call at the world body, for someone used to autocues, he intoned a competent if uninspiring sermon to the assembled world leaders. And avoided tricky names.
Luckily, the world had low expectations of his first visit eight years ago, so it could keep its disappointment within limits when he lowered the bar. Since then Bush has started several wars, threatened several more and brought the global economy to the precipice, while leaving his ungrateful nation several trillion dollars in extra debts from the Iraq war and bailouts to financial institutions – not a mention a few extra billion to the guys who owned and ran those institutions. It was not the best of backdrops for a farewell performance.
Most of the sentiments in his speech would have been unexceptional, and the congregation would have nodded in agreement and off to doze, were it not for the total disconnect between the sentiments expressed and the behaviour of the preacher.
He preached: "As sovereign states, we have an obligation to govern responsibly and solve problems before they spill across borders. We have an obligation to prevent our territory from being used as a sanctuary for terrorism and proliferation and human trafficking and organised crime."
All true, but it would ring more so if did not come from the lips of someone whose government was "trafficking" humans in rendition flights across the globe, or even one who had not allowed bank lobbyists to craft the financial regime that now threatens to crash the global economy.
"No cause can justify the deliberate taking of innocent human life," he said, which is almost beyond comment, although I am sure some Iraqi, Afghan or Pakistani villagers could be found who would rise to the task, let alone Lebanese villagers or Gazans minced up by US-supplied munitions.
The brave talk at Annapolis has shrunk down to one terse reference to "the people of the Palestinian Territories, who deserve a free and peaceful state of their own." If the settlers backed by American money leave them any space or water for it.
Of course, one of Bush's problems is that by the time he came to realise the usefulness, and indeed the indispensability of working through the UN, he had made it difficult for anyone to take his overtures seriously. It was the road to Baghdad rather than the road to Damascus that saw his conversion. There he and his neocon advisers were, cock-a-hoop at their victory, and there was nothing they could do with it. They could not sell Iraqi oil, and any regime they installed would have zero legitimacy.
They brought in the UN, but even though the UN administration and the security council were forgiving and went along, they could not show gratitude. Sending John Bolton was the equivalent of putting King Herod in charge of Unicef, as the White House, now savaged almost weekly by Bolton's Parthian fusillades, may realise. It does not help that Bush happily echoed Bolton's flip denigrations of the institution, calling it "the wax museum", seemingly insouciant that if you want people to rally to a flag, even a blue one, it's best not to smear it with crap before and even while you are waving it.
"The objectives I've laid out for multilateral institutions - confronting terror, opposing tyranny and promoting effective development - are difficult, but they are necessary tasks," Bush said. Presumably unlike climate change, which got not a single mention, despite Ban Ki-moon, who had just spoken about it as the "defining issue of our era". Bush presumably has great expectations of a lucrative post-retirement career funded by big oil.
Even so, Bolton will now be even grumpier, since his once-unilateral president used the word "multilateral" no less than nine times in his speech. But as with his predecessor, Bill Clinton, Bush used it without the connotations of collegiality with which less powerful nations imbue it. "Do as I say, not as I do" was the constant subtext.
Above all Bush cherishes the illusion that for the billions of the world faced with climate change, pollution, mass repression and killing by governments, not to mention simple starvation, "terrorism" is the biggest threat. He returned to it over and over again – and it can't be for domestic reasons, since polls suggest that the American electorate have put it in it proper perspective.
But look on the bright side, Bolton will be peeved that the Axis of Evil is currently down to two, Syria and Iran, although Hugo Chávez and Raul Castro may feel self-righteously peeved at being left out.
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Annapolis: full text "The Road Map's Dead-end"
The road map's dead-end
The Annapolis peace conference looming later this month will fail unless the Quartet powers finally screw up their map and get down to business
Ian Williams
November 12, 2007 6:30 PM | Printable version
Coming soon to a TV screen near you later this month is the latest global Origami challenge, also known as the Annapolis Middle East peace conference. There a piece of paper formerly known as the "road map", will be folded, torn and squeezed through yet more quantum-style dimensions in an attempt to prove it still has life.
In theoretical physics, superstring theorists posit up to eleven dimensions, most of them invisible. The road map, in contrast, has no less than fourteen strings that Ariel Sharon attached, all of which are invisible, or at least tacitly ignored by Britain and the "Quartet" of Russia, Europe, the UN and the US.
In reality, of course, it shows fewer vital signs than John Cleese's parrot or Ariel Sharon on life support.
Indeed, it is an easy feat to ignore Sharon's 14 "reservations" when almost the entire West ignores the separation wall that rather ostentatiously blocks off the road map, while defying a world court legal ruling against it. If these pillars of the international community actually noticed them in public, then they would be forced to admit that the Israeli government has been driving way off the direction indicated by the road map, and perhaps do something about it: like refusing the Israeli recalcitrants diplomatic, military and financial support.
Indeed, taken together, the Sharon reservations make it plain that Native American reservation status would almost be an advance for the Palestinians, compared with the Bantustans that the Israeli government has been preparing for.
Sharon, when he withdrew from Gaza, explained that the purpose was to consolidate Israel's hold on the West Bank settlements, and the government put water, electricity, roads, police and army guards into the expanding settlements even as he solemnly promised to observe the road map prohibitions against expanding them. But somehow it was considered rude to listen in on a not-so private conversation between the butcher of Sabra and Shatila and his electorate.
The EU, which is Israel's biggest trading partner, would be forced to slap on some tariffs until Israel fulfilled its promises and obligations under its agreements. The UN may notice that Israel is defiant of a string of UN resolutions, which were at the time supported by the US and UK as well as the other members.
The only viable two state solution is one that, firstly secures the consent of Hamas the large proportion, perhaps the majority of the Palestinians, that it represents. That really depends on how close the negotiations get to the Saudi plan, which is essentially for Israeli acceptance of the UN resolutions, particularly those on the withdrawal from occupied territories (which includes of course, as the Syrians point out, the Golan Heights.)
The problem with that is, of course, that three years ago George Bush abrogated international law and almost 40 years of American foreign policy by declaring that because of "new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it [was] unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949." In other words, if a thief hangs on to the property long enough, he gains title. It is an interesting, but not persuasive, gloss on international law.
This is not like the squatter who asserts title by occupying property unchallenged for seven years. This occupation has been challenged consistently from the beginning.
The latest indication that the success of the conference depends on the Palestinians giving up all their legal rights under American and Israeli pressure is the report of Israeli dissatisfaction with the Palestinians' negotiations support unit, which was a result of Robin Cook's time in the Foreign Office. The team, paid for by Britain and others, is preparing the legal brief and senior Israeli officials say the unit is "increasingly becoming an obstacle with regard to progress after the Annapolis conference".
In other words, it will not do what it is told.
There are some signs that Condoleezza Rice at least recognizes that Israel's best interests are served by forgetting the dead-end road map and negotiating on the basis of the Saudi peace plan and the UN resolutions. One can hope that the US will provide the stick as well as the carrot to the Israeli donkey. But you would really need a faith-based belief in miracles.
The Annapolis peace conference looming later this month will fail unless the Quartet powers finally screw up their map and get down to business
Ian Williams
November 12, 2007 6:30 PM | Printable version
Coming soon to a TV screen near you later this month is the latest global Origami challenge, also known as the Annapolis Middle East peace conference. There a piece of paper formerly known as the "road map", will be folded, torn and squeezed through yet more quantum-style dimensions in an attempt to prove it still has life.
In theoretical physics, superstring theorists posit up to eleven dimensions, most of them invisible. The road map, in contrast, has no less than fourteen strings that Ariel Sharon attached, all of which are invisible, or at least tacitly ignored by Britain and the "Quartet" of Russia, Europe, the UN and the US.
In reality, of course, it shows fewer vital signs than John Cleese's parrot or Ariel Sharon on life support.
Indeed, it is an easy feat to ignore Sharon's 14 "reservations" when almost the entire West ignores the separation wall that rather ostentatiously blocks off the road map, while defying a world court legal ruling against it. If these pillars of the international community actually noticed them in public, then they would be forced to admit that the Israeli government has been driving way off the direction indicated by the road map, and perhaps do something about it: like refusing the Israeli recalcitrants diplomatic, military and financial support.
Indeed, taken together, the Sharon reservations make it plain that Native American reservation status would almost be an advance for the Palestinians, compared with the Bantustans that the Israeli government has been preparing for.
Sharon, when he withdrew from Gaza, explained that the purpose was to consolidate Israel's hold on the West Bank settlements, and the government put water, electricity, roads, police and army guards into the expanding settlements even as he solemnly promised to observe the road map prohibitions against expanding them. But somehow it was considered rude to listen in on a not-so private conversation between the butcher of Sabra and Shatila and his electorate.
The EU, which is Israel's biggest trading partner, would be forced to slap on some tariffs until Israel fulfilled its promises and obligations under its agreements. The UN may notice that Israel is defiant of a string of UN resolutions, which were at the time supported by the US and UK as well as the other members.
The only viable two state solution is one that, firstly secures the consent of Hamas the large proportion, perhaps the majority of the Palestinians, that it represents. That really depends on how close the negotiations get to the Saudi plan, which is essentially for Israeli acceptance of the UN resolutions, particularly those on the withdrawal from occupied territories (which includes of course, as the Syrians point out, the Golan Heights.)
The problem with that is, of course, that three years ago George Bush abrogated international law and almost 40 years of American foreign policy by declaring that because of "new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it [was] unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949." In other words, if a thief hangs on to the property long enough, he gains title. It is an interesting, but not persuasive, gloss on international law.
This is not like the squatter who asserts title by occupying property unchallenged for seven years. This occupation has been challenged consistently from the beginning.
The latest indication that the success of the conference depends on the Palestinians giving up all their legal rights under American and Israeli pressure is the report of Israeli dissatisfaction with the Palestinians' negotiations support unit, which was a result of Robin Cook's time in the Foreign Office. The team, paid for by Britain and others, is preparing the legal brief and senior Israeli officials say the unit is "increasingly becoming an obstacle with regard to progress after the Annapolis conference".
In other words, it will not do what it is told.
There are some signs that Condoleezza Rice at least recognizes that Israel's best interests are served by forgetting the dead-end road map and negotiating on the basis of the Saudi peace plan and the UN resolutions. One can hope that the US will provide the stick as well as the carrot to the Israeli donkey. But you would really need a faith-based belief in miracles.
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
Sporting Chances for Burma?
China's Olympic workout
The Beijing Games next year may prove to be China's Achilles heel - if human rights groups can hit it.
Full text of Comment is Free
October 1, 2007 11:00 AM | Printable version
The UN general assembly and the Olympics may not seem that connected, but there are similarities. The latter is an official occasion for global peace and harmony to which almost every country in the world sends its national team to compete ferociously with others and whip up varying degrees of nationalist fervour at home.
Last week's meeting of the general assembly was no different, although we did miss Hugo Chavez's attempt to expand President Bush's reading material beyond the Pet Goat. There was something quite athletic about how different delegations raced up the aisles in the competitive walkout stakes to make sure that a row of empty seats greeted whoever the demon of the day was as he took the rostrum. The sprint was definitely the race that the original Olympians, the Greeks, won to protest the omission of (Former Yugoslav Republic of) from Macedonia's title.
The Cuban foreign minister's articulate and, sad to say, factually based (if somewhat one-sided) verbal assault on Bush, in reply to the latter's attack on Castro, played a nice counterpart to the orotundly obscure style of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. In fact the puzzled expressions of the Iranian and American presidents almost had me thinking they were competing for the Mad Magazine Alfred E Neuman "What, Me Worry?" gold medal. (Bush wins on quotes.)
But the Iranian did actually put himself forward for the press - as long as they were not from the Israeli team. Bush may be somewhat challenged, but he knows his limitations enough to avoid unchoreographed and unscripted press conferences.
It may have been my early years as a conductor on football trains, but I've always been very dubious of the idea that sport and peace go hand in hand. Even apart from the personal experience of trying to fend off scores of rabid fans after someone's blood, sport's track record of promoting harmony does not impress. It is not just the fans - think of the football war of 1969. The Olympics has not been much better.
Indeed totalitarianism and the track seem much more closely related. From Hitler in 1936 - and it would have been held in Tokyo in 1940 if throwing javelins had not been overshadowed by firing shells - right on to Beijing, tough regimes love sport. Just look at the gymnastic splendour of a Kim Jong Il birthday party, the inhumane training regime of the East Germans.
At least one thing that can be said about the major American sports, baseball and the American version of football, is that since few other countries play them at a serious level, they are not really the occasions for xenophobic competitiveness on a grand scale. It seems like archetypal American isolationism that they have a baseball World Series just for themselves.
But the Beijing Olympics offers a genuine opportunity for peace. The Chinese are so concerned about urination on their 2008 parade that human rights organisations and governments that support human rights (and even those like Bush's that pretend to do so) have a rare but serious opportunity to get the Chinese onside. The Taiwanese know this - that's why they are staging their referendum on UN membership early in the New Year - not long before the Olympics.
From Darfur to Rangoon, there are definite signals that roguish states that have benefited from Chinese diplomatic protection are feeling a little chilly. The more calls there are for boycotts, the less likely Beijing is to go out on a limb for its mass murdering friends.
Human rights supporters should keep talking boycotts, and they may even put some truth in the rumours of a responsibility to protect that the UN general assembly voted for in 2005, with none against. China seems to have forgotten that principle - that mass murders by governments are a threat to international peace and security that demand United Nations action.
The Beijing Games next year may prove to be China's Achilles heel - if human rights groups can hit it.
Full text of Comment is Free
October 1, 2007 11:00 AM | Printable version
The UN general assembly and the Olympics may not seem that connected, but there are similarities. The latter is an official occasion for global peace and harmony to which almost every country in the world sends its national team to compete ferociously with others and whip up varying degrees of nationalist fervour at home.
Last week's meeting of the general assembly was no different, although we did miss Hugo Chavez's attempt to expand President Bush's reading material beyond the Pet Goat. There was something quite athletic about how different delegations raced up the aisles in the competitive walkout stakes to make sure that a row of empty seats greeted whoever the demon of the day was as he took the rostrum. The sprint was definitely the race that the original Olympians, the Greeks, won to protest the omission of (Former Yugoslav Republic of) from Macedonia's title.
The Cuban foreign minister's articulate and, sad to say, factually based (if somewhat one-sided) verbal assault on Bush, in reply to the latter's attack on Castro, played a nice counterpart to the orotundly obscure style of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. In fact the puzzled expressions of the Iranian and American presidents almost had me thinking they were competing for the Mad Magazine Alfred E Neuman "What, Me Worry?" gold medal. (Bush wins on quotes.)
But the Iranian did actually put himself forward for the press - as long as they were not from the Israeli team. Bush may be somewhat challenged, but he knows his limitations enough to avoid unchoreographed and unscripted press conferences.
It may have been my early years as a conductor on football trains, but I've always been very dubious of the idea that sport and peace go hand in hand. Even apart from the personal experience of trying to fend off scores of rabid fans after someone's blood, sport's track record of promoting harmony does not impress. It is not just the fans - think of the football war of 1969. The Olympics has not been much better.
Indeed totalitarianism and the track seem much more closely related. From Hitler in 1936 - and it would have been held in Tokyo in 1940 if throwing javelins had not been overshadowed by firing shells - right on to Beijing, tough regimes love sport. Just look at the gymnastic splendour of a Kim Jong Il birthday party, the inhumane training regime of the East Germans.
At least one thing that can be said about the major American sports, baseball and the American version of football, is that since few other countries play them at a serious level, they are not really the occasions for xenophobic competitiveness on a grand scale. It seems like archetypal American isolationism that they have a baseball World Series just for themselves.
But the Beijing Olympics offers a genuine opportunity for peace. The Chinese are so concerned about urination on their 2008 parade that human rights organisations and governments that support human rights (and even those like Bush's that pretend to do so) have a rare but serious opportunity to get the Chinese onside. The Taiwanese know this - that's why they are staging their referendum on UN membership early in the New Year - not long before the Olympics.
From Darfur to Rangoon, there are definite signals that roguish states that have benefited from Chinese diplomatic protection are feeling a little chilly. The more calls there are for boycotts, the less likely Beijing is to go out on a limb for its mass murdering friends.
Human rights supporters should keep talking boycotts, and they may even put some truth in the rumours of a responsibility to protect that the UN general assembly voted for in 2005, with none against. China seems to have forgotten that principle - that mass murders by governments are a threat to international peace and security that demand United Nations action.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Shock, horror, a truthful UN report.
Here are two of my reports in today's Guardian on the Secret UN report condemns US for Middle East failures which also carries Alvaro de Soto's excellent report on the failures of the peace process
Envoy's damning verdict revealed as violence takes Gaza closer to civil war
Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem and Ian Williams in New York
Wednesday June 13, 2007
The Guardian
The highest ranking UN official in Israel has warned that American pressure has "pummelled into submission" the UN's role as an impartial Middle East negotiator in a damning confidential report.
The 53-page "End of Mission Report" by Alvaro de Soto, the UN's Middle East envoy, obtained by the Guardian, presents a devastating account of failed diplomacy and condemns the sweeping boycott of the Palestinian government. It is dated May 5 this year, just before Mr de Soto stepped down.
The revelations from inside the UN come after another day of escalating violence in Gaza, when at least 26 Palestinians were killed after Hamas fighters launched a major assault. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, head of the rival Fatah group, warned he was facing an attempted coup.
Mr de Soto condemns Israel for setting unachievable preconditions for talks and the Palestinians for their violence. Western-led peace negotiations have become largely irrelevant, he says.
Mr de Soto is a Peruvian diplomat who worked for the UN for 25 years in El Salvador, Cyprus and Western Sahara. He says:
· The international boycott of the Palestinians, introduced after Hamas won elections last year, was "at best extremely short-sighted" and had "devastating consequences" for the Palestinian people
· Israel has adopted an "essentially rejectionist" stance towards the Palestinians
· The Quartet of Middle East negotiators - the US, the EU, Russia and the UN - has become a "side-show"
·The Palestinian record of stopping violence against Israel is "patchy at best, reprehensible at worst"
Mr de Soto acknowledges in the report that he is its sole author. It was meant only for senior UN officials, and its wording is far more critical than the public pronouncements of UN diplomats. Last night, Mr de Soto, who is in New York, told the Guardian: "It is a confidential document and not intended for publication."
In January last year, the Quartet called on the newly elected Hamas government to commit to non-violence, recognise Israel and accept previous agreements. When Hamas refused to sign up to the principles, the international community halted direct funding to the Palestinian government and Israel started to freeze the monthly tax revenues that it had agreed to pass to the Palestinians. Several hundred million dollars remain frozen.
Mr de Soto, who had opposed the boycott, said this position "effectively transformed the Quartet from a negotiation-promoting foursome guided by a common document [the road map for peace] into a body that was all-but imposing sanctions on a freely elected government of a people under occupation as well as setting unattainable preconditions for dialogue".
The EU said yesterday that there was an imminent risk of civil war if fighting went on, and UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon urged support for Mr Abbas's efforts "to restore law and order".
In the heaviest day of fighting in Gaza for months, Hamas appeared to make its first concerted effort to seize power in Gaza. There was a wave of co-ordinated attacks, which appeared to overwhelm the larger but less effective Fatah force. "Decisiveness will be in the field," said Islam Shahwan, a spokesman for the Hamas military wing.
Fatah's central committee called an emergency meeting in Ramallah, in the West Bank, and said it would suspend the activities of its ministers in the government. Fatah would pull out of the government if the fighting failed to stop, it said.
For the first time in several weeks, fighting spread to the West Bank when Fatah gunmen attacked a Hamas television studio in Ramallah and kidnapped a Hamas deputy cabinet minister from the city.
The day began with a rocket attack on the private house in Gaza of Ismail Haniyeh, the prime minister and a Hamas leader. He was in the building but was not hurt. Fighting spread across Gaza City and within hours Hamas fighters issued warnings over loudspeakers calling on all Fatah security forces to pull out of their bases and return home. At about 2pm Hamas gunmen seized control of several small Fatah bases and one large base in northern Gaza, where there were heavy casualties when Hamas fighters fired mortars and rocket-propelled grenades at the compound.
Several Fatah officers complained that they had received no orders during the day. Mr Abbas tried calling for a truce, and later Fatah ordered its officers to fight back.
N was pummelled into submission, says outgoing Middle East special envoy
· Negotiators 'lost impartiality' says report
· Palestinians also criticised over violence
Read Alvaro de Soto's end of mission report
Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem and Ian Williams in New York
Wednesday June 13, 2007
The Guardian
American support for Israel has hindered international efforts to broker a peace deal in the Middle East, according to a hard-hitting confidential report from the outgoing UN Middle East envoy.
Alvaro de Soto, who stepped down last month after 25 years at the UN, has exposed the American pressure that he argues has damaged the impartiality of the UN's peace making efforts.
In Mr de Soto's "End of Mission Report", which the Guardian has obtained, he delivers a devastating criticism of both Israelis and Palestinians, as well as the international community.
The Quartet of Middle East negotiators - the UN, the US, the EU and Russia - has often failed to hold Israel to its obligations under the Road Map, the current framework for peace talks, he argues.
Over the past two years, the Quartet has gradually lost its impartiality. "The fact is that even-handedness has been pummelled into submission in an unprecedented way since the beginning of 2007," he writes.
He blames overwhelming influence exerted by the US and an "ensuing tendency toward self-censorship" within the UN when it comes to criticism of Israel.
"At almost every juncture a premium is put on good relations with the US and improving the UN's relationship with Israel. I have no problem with either goal but I do have a problem with self-delusion," he writes. "Forgetting our ability to influence the Palestinian scene in the hope that it keeps open doors to Israel is to trade our Ace for a Joker."
Mr de Soto reveals that after Hamas won elections last year it wanted to form a broad coalition government with its more moderate rivals, including Fatah, run by the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. But the US discouraged other Palestinian politicians from joining. "We were told that the US was against any 'blurring' of the line dividing Hamas from those Palestinian political forces committed to the two-state solution," Mr de Soto writes. It was a year before a coalition government was finally formed.
The US also supported the Israeli decision to freeze Palestinian tax revenues. "The Quartet has been prevented from pronouncing on this because the US, as its representatives have intimated to us, does not wish Israel to transfer these funds to the PA [Palestinian Authority]," he writes. "There is a seeming reflex, in any given situation where the UN is to take a position, to ask first how Israel or Washington will react rather than what is the right position to take."
Mr de Soto opposed the international boycott placed on the Palestinian government after Hamas won elections last year. He argued that it was wrong to use pressure and isolation alone, and proposed retaining dialogue with Hamas. He wanted tougher criticism of Israel as well, but came up against a "heavy barrage" from US officials.
The effect of the boycott was to seriously damage the Palestinian economy and promote radicalism. It also lifted pressure from Israel. "With all focus on the failings of Hamas, the Israeli settlement enterprise and barrier construction has continued unabated," he writes.
The US, he argues, was clearly pushing for a confrontation between Fatah and Hamas but Washington misjudged Mr Abbas, who he argues had wanted to co-opt rather than defeat Hamas. Fighting between Fatah and Hamas has intensified in recent months. He quotes an unnamed US official as saying earlier this year: "I like this violence ... It means that other Palestinians are resisting Hamas." Since December at least 600 Palestinians have been killed in factional battles.
The report criticises the Palestinians for their violence, and Israel for extending its settlements and barrier in the West Bank. But he also argues that Israeli policies have encouraged continued Palestinian militancy. "I wonder if the Israeli authorities realise that, season after season, they are reaping what they sow, and are systematically pushing along the violence/repression cycle to the point where it is self-propelling," he writes.
Mr de Soto speaks of his frustration in the job, not least that he was refused permission to meet the Hamas and Syrian governments in Damascus. "At best I have been the UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace process in name only, and since the election of Hamas, I have been the secretary-general's personal representative to the Palestinian Authority for about 10 minutes in two phone calls and one handshake," he writes.
He stepped down in May at the end of his two-year contract and left the UN. The "tipping-point" for his departure came after the new UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon said future meetings with a Palestinian prime minister would depend on the actions of his government.
Michele Montas, spokesperson for Mr Ban, said: "It is deeply regrettable that this report has been leaked. The whole point of an end-of-mission report is for our envoys and special representatives to be as candid as possible ... the views in the report should not be considered official UN policy."
Envoy's damning verdict revealed as violence takes Gaza closer to civil war
Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem and Ian Williams in New York
Wednesday June 13, 2007
The Guardian
The highest ranking UN official in Israel has warned that American pressure has "pummelled into submission" the UN's role as an impartial Middle East negotiator in a damning confidential report.
The 53-page "End of Mission Report" by Alvaro de Soto, the UN's Middle East envoy, obtained by the Guardian, presents a devastating account of failed diplomacy and condemns the sweeping boycott of the Palestinian government. It is dated May 5 this year, just before Mr de Soto stepped down.
The revelations from inside the UN come after another day of escalating violence in Gaza, when at least 26 Palestinians were killed after Hamas fighters launched a major assault. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, head of the rival Fatah group, warned he was facing an attempted coup.
Mr de Soto condemns Israel for setting unachievable preconditions for talks and the Palestinians for their violence. Western-led peace negotiations have become largely irrelevant, he says.
Mr de Soto is a Peruvian diplomat who worked for the UN for 25 years in El Salvador, Cyprus and Western Sahara. He says:
· The international boycott of the Palestinians, introduced after Hamas won elections last year, was "at best extremely short-sighted" and had "devastating consequences" for the Palestinian people
· Israel has adopted an "essentially rejectionist" stance towards the Palestinians
· The Quartet of Middle East negotiators - the US, the EU, Russia and the UN - has become a "side-show"
·The Palestinian record of stopping violence against Israel is "patchy at best, reprehensible at worst"
Mr de Soto acknowledges in the report that he is its sole author. It was meant only for senior UN officials, and its wording is far more critical than the public pronouncements of UN diplomats. Last night, Mr de Soto, who is in New York, told the Guardian: "It is a confidential document and not intended for publication."
In January last year, the Quartet called on the newly elected Hamas government to commit to non-violence, recognise Israel and accept previous agreements. When Hamas refused to sign up to the principles, the international community halted direct funding to the Palestinian government and Israel started to freeze the monthly tax revenues that it had agreed to pass to the Palestinians. Several hundred million dollars remain frozen.
Mr de Soto, who had opposed the boycott, said this position "effectively transformed the Quartet from a negotiation-promoting foursome guided by a common document [the road map for peace] into a body that was all-but imposing sanctions on a freely elected government of a people under occupation as well as setting unattainable preconditions for dialogue".
The EU said yesterday that there was an imminent risk of civil war if fighting went on, and UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon urged support for Mr Abbas's efforts "to restore law and order".
In the heaviest day of fighting in Gaza for months, Hamas appeared to make its first concerted effort to seize power in Gaza. There was a wave of co-ordinated attacks, which appeared to overwhelm the larger but less effective Fatah force. "Decisiveness will be in the field," said Islam Shahwan, a spokesman for the Hamas military wing.
Fatah's central committee called an emergency meeting in Ramallah, in the West Bank, and said it would suspend the activities of its ministers in the government. Fatah would pull out of the government if the fighting failed to stop, it said.
For the first time in several weeks, fighting spread to the West Bank when Fatah gunmen attacked a Hamas television studio in Ramallah and kidnapped a Hamas deputy cabinet minister from the city.
The day began with a rocket attack on the private house in Gaza of Ismail Haniyeh, the prime minister and a Hamas leader. He was in the building but was not hurt. Fighting spread across Gaza City and within hours Hamas fighters issued warnings over loudspeakers calling on all Fatah security forces to pull out of their bases and return home. At about 2pm Hamas gunmen seized control of several small Fatah bases and one large base in northern Gaza, where there were heavy casualties when Hamas fighters fired mortars and rocket-propelled grenades at the compound.
Several Fatah officers complained that they had received no orders during the day. Mr Abbas tried calling for a truce, and later Fatah ordered its officers to fight back.
N was pummelled into submission, says outgoing Middle East special envoy
· Negotiators 'lost impartiality' says report
· Palestinians also criticised over violence
Read Alvaro de Soto's end of mission report
Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem and Ian Williams in New York
Wednesday June 13, 2007
The Guardian
American support for Israel has hindered international efforts to broker a peace deal in the Middle East, according to a hard-hitting confidential report from the outgoing UN Middle East envoy.
Alvaro de Soto, who stepped down last month after 25 years at the UN, has exposed the American pressure that he argues has damaged the impartiality of the UN's peace making efforts.
In Mr de Soto's "End of Mission Report", which the Guardian has obtained, he delivers a devastating criticism of both Israelis and Palestinians, as well as the international community.
The Quartet of Middle East negotiators - the UN, the US, the EU and Russia - has often failed to hold Israel to its obligations under the Road Map, the current framework for peace talks, he argues.
Over the past two years, the Quartet has gradually lost its impartiality. "The fact is that even-handedness has been pummelled into submission in an unprecedented way since the beginning of 2007," he writes.
He blames overwhelming influence exerted by the US and an "ensuing tendency toward self-censorship" within the UN when it comes to criticism of Israel.
"At almost every juncture a premium is put on good relations with the US and improving the UN's relationship with Israel. I have no problem with either goal but I do have a problem with self-delusion," he writes. "Forgetting our ability to influence the Palestinian scene in the hope that it keeps open doors to Israel is to trade our Ace for a Joker."
Mr de Soto reveals that after Hamas won elections last year it wanted to form a broad coalition government with its more moderate rivals, including Fatah, run by the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. But the US discouraged other Palestinian politicians from joining. "We were told that the US was against any 'blurring' of the line dividing Hamas from those Palestinian political forces committed to the two-state solution," Mr de Soto writes. It was a year before a coalition government was finally formed.
The US also supported the Israeli decision to freeze Palestinian tax revenues. "The Quartet has been prevented from pronouncing on this because the US, as its representatives have intimated to us, does not wish Israel to transfer these funds to the PA [Palestinian Authority]," he writes. "There is a seeming reflex, in any given situation where the UN is to take a position, to ask first how Israel or Washington will react rather than what is the right position to take."
Mr de Soto opposed the international boycott placed on the Palestinian government after Hamas won elections last year. He argued that it was wrong to use pressure and isolation alone, and proposed retaining dialogue with Hamas. He wanted tougher criticism of Israel as well, but came up against a "heavy barrage" from US officials.
The effect of the boycott was to seriously damage the Palestinian economy and promote radicalism. It also lifted pressure from Israel. "With all focus on the failings of Hamas, the Israeli settlement enterprise and barrier construction has continued unabated," he writes.
The US, he argues, was clearly pushing for a confrontation between Fatah and Hamas but Washington misjudged Mr Abbas, who he argues had wanted to co-opt rather than defeat Hamas. Fighting between Fatah and Hamas has intensified in recent months. He quotes an unnamed US official as saying earlier this year: "I like this violence ... It means that other Palestinians are resisting Hamas." Since December at least 600 Palestinians have been killed in factional battles.
The report criticises the Palestinians for their violence, and Israel for extending its settlements and barrier in the West Bank. But he also argues that Israeli policies have encouraged continued Palestinian militancy. "I wonder if the Israeli authorities realise that, season after season, they are reaping what they sow, and are systematically pushing along the violence/repression cycle to the point where it is self-propelling," he writes.
Mr de Soto speaks of his frustration in the job, not least that he was refused permission to meet the Hamas and Syrian governments in Damascus. "At best I have been the UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace process in name only, and since the election of Hamas, I have been the secretary-general's personal representative to the Palestinian Authority for about 10 minutes in two phone calls and one handshake," he writes.
He stepped down in May at the end of his two-year contract and left the UN. The "tipping-point" for his departure came after the new UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon said future meetings with a Palestinian prime minister would depend on the actions of his government.
Michele Montas, spokesperson for Mr Ban, said: "It is deeply regrettable that this report has been leaked. The whole point of an end-of-mission report is for our envoys and special representatives to be as candid as possible ... the views in the report should not be considered official UN policy."
Friday, June 01, 2007
Monday, March 26, 2007
Testing the Tightrope
From the April edition of the World Today, journal of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, Chatham House.
Testing the Tightrope
UN SECRETARY-GENERAL
FROM IAN WILLIAMS IN NEW YORK
As Winston Churchill said of his successor Clement Attlee, Ban Ki-Moon is a very modest man. It remains to be seen whether the United Nations Secretary-General also has ‘much to be modest about’. As the traditional hundred-day deadline for assessing new office-holders approaches, there is a quite remarkable lack of information on which to base any assessment. Ban shows no sign of rushing. With unprecedented time to effect a transition, he could have started running with a full team – unless he was waiting for former United States Ambassador John Bolton to go.
Ban Ki-moon brought a team of Koreans with him to the United Nations, seven according to most reports, regardless of his official nominations to office. Most notable is Kim Won-soo who was the mastermind of Ban’s election campaign to become Secretary-General. Now officially the assistant to newly appointed chef de cabinet Vijay Nambiar, UN staff report that Kim is no eminence grise, but is indeed very openly assertive in his authority.
But neither he nor his compatriots at UN headquarters are open about much else. Neither Ban nor his team have taken any great pains to explain themselves to senior staff, let alone to the media and the public.
Consequently, no one can be sure how deeply in debt Ban feels to the Americans for their electoral support, or indeed whether the nature of any such obligation has changed with the removal of Ambassador John Bolton and the change of control in Congress.
Spoils System
Ban’s appointment of B. Lynn Pascoe, a veteran United States diplomat, to head the Department of Political Affairs sent one sign. But his retreat from plans to put the substantive part of the peacekeeping department under the American, and his refinement of original proposals to downgrade disarmament affairs could be a joint product of a change of emphasis in Washington, or resistance from other member states.
Pascoe is an accomplished diplomat, well versed in Asian affairs, who even speaks Mandarin. If it had to be an American, then he is possibly the best for the position. Nonetheless, having an American, or for that matter, in the current state of the relationship between British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George Bush, a British nominee in such a crucial position, is bad for the UN and for Washington.
Despite its churlish lack of public enthusiasm, the US relies increasingly on the UN for major parts of global policing that would otherwise consume its increasingly challenged resources. And
one of the advantages of the UN is that its global legitimacy gives it an appearance of neutrality that Pascoe’s presence may belie.
The Security Council permanent members’ spoils system as applied to senior UN positions has led traditionally to a reliance on a kitchen cabinet of people you can trust. However, in Ban’s case, these all seem to be Korean. Senior UN staff report that insofar as the Korean team has manifested an agenda, it is ‘reform’, which it is pursuing with singular intensity – and on which it also seems to be taking advice from the Americans, although it is certainly a personal preoccupation of Ban’s.
Reform Rhetoric
Following an American reform agenda could be very frustrating since the Humpty Dumpty principle applies, ‘When I use a word, it means just what I want it to mean, neither more nor less’. For significant constituencies in Washington, reform means that the organisation will do what it is told, when it is told, by the US. In particular it would be expected to drop its traditional support for international law in the Middle East, particularly the Palestinian rights programmes.
One indication of trouble ahead is indeed the Middle East. Retiring Secretary-General Kofi Annan got scant thanks for trying hard to engage Israel in the organisation, without abandoning the Palestinian case in international law and the catalogue of UN decisions. There are some indications that Ban is not overly concerned about the latter, and by being somewhat over-receptive to Washington’s input, is heading for a confrontation with Arab and Islamic states and their non-aligned allies. In the UN version of Kremlinology, it was regarded as significant that Israel steered him away from going to Gaza during his March visit.
The Group of 77 developing nations are, with some justice, concerned because they know the American political agenda lurking beneath the managerial reform rhetoric. Bolton could hardly be accused of hiding it! Many would prefer an inefficient status quo in which their concerns will be addressed, to an efficient machine that excludes their agenda.
It must also be admitted that for a developing country ambassador, the prospects of a reincarnated career in the UN also looms large in the calculations. They know how to work the present system and would not welcome a slimmed down meritocracy they suspect would be under western control.
Tactical not Technocratic
Ban has tried to pre-emptively head off their opposition to his plans with senior appointments carefully spread around the global south. Many people suspect that, unless he has seen hidden depths unobserved by others in some of his appointees, a number of selections have been more tactical than technocratic.
Very late in his second term, Annan went to the long neglected root of the rot in the UN’s personnel system – and even then only after appointing Anne
Veneman, the White House nominee to head the traditional American fiefdom of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to avert US opposition.
Briefly the UN advertised and conducted a passable search process for candidates for senior positions, for example choosing Kemal Dervis of Turkey for the traditional Anglo-Saxon realm of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). And then right at the end, under heavy White House pressure, after consulting Ban, Annan appointed a Bush nominee, Josette Sheeran Shiner as head of the World Food Programme. She is a former editor of the Moony-owned Washington Times.
Following that, Ban abandoned this brief burst of genuine reform and has chosen a series of candidates who appear to represent pay-offs to powers that could have, but did not, veto his candidacy. Despite a reform pledge to cycle anyone more than five years in one position, he reappointed the French candidate, Jean-Marie Guéhenno as head of peacekeeping.
Sir John Holmes, a Blair nominee, became head of the Department of Humanitarian Affairs, a task in which he may succeed, but for which he is less qualified than the political affairs job the
British hoped for. And of course the reason that London had to accept a consolation prize was the most significant pay-back of all, Pascoe. It may be reform, but hardly root and branch.
Short on Substance
So what are Ban’s prospects? Any Secretary-General has to balance the aspirations of the bulk of the membership and the imperious demands of the great powers, in particular the US. Annan was extremely adept at this, for which he was rewarded with mutterings from the nonaligned that he was an American puppet and a two year campaign of vilification from US conservatives.
The Bush administration policy was ‘Bear not false witness: let the lie/Have time on its own wings to fly’. The White House did not start the slanderous campaign about the failures of the Iraq Oil for Food Programme, but it certainly did nothing to rein it in, and took advantage of Annan's weakened position. Ban should learn the lesson that that American support lasts only
until the first disagreement.
Some observers, unimpressed by Ban’s approach, and perhaps irritated by his own boast to the title of the ‘slippery eel’, for his avoidance of substance, have assumed he is the lacklustre product of a
backroom fix. But that is no truer than of any of his predecessors.
Indeed, while last year’s voting itself had all the transparency of a papal conclave, the campaign was unprecedentedly open, and Ban acquitted himself well on the hustings. For example, when asked about the International Criminal Court, and the doctrine of Responsibility to Protect, he declared himself unequivocally in favour of both – even though one was hardly designed to woo Bolton’s vote, while the other was not exactly what Beijing may have wanted.
Like Annan, Ban is personally very affable and approachable, but quietly spoken, and has given evidence of strong ethics. No one could be foreign minister of a fulcrum state like South Korea without developing Annan-like skills at tightrope walking. In recent years South Korea has contrived to loyally disagree with Washington even though its survival has depended on American military support. Indeed, the few hints we see of his decision-making suggest some very intricate balancing acts.
Annan, more than any recent Secretary-General realised that in the absence of serious military or financial power, careful cultivation of a public persona of trustworthy moral authority provided the best substitute. Despite indifferent speaking skills, and very carefully weighing every word, he was
initially very successful in this.
One way in which Annan succeeded was to open up the organisation to the media in an unprecedented way. Previously, staff rules forbade talking to the press, but he reversed the position so that they were mandated to do so on areas in which they had competence. He also surrounded himself with a team that could articulately fill in the gaps in his diplomatically constrained public discussion.
It is to be hoped that Ban may begin to realise what he is missing. There is no point in having the world’s most prominent bully pulpit if he is not prepared to read the occasional sermon and deliver some ringing ex cathedra judgments. He will find that soft power is the strongest weapon in his armoury.
IAN WILLIAMS is Editor of the forthcoming Guide to the UN, published
by CQ Press
Testing the Tightrope
UN SECRETARY-GENERAL
FROM IAN WILLIAMS IN NEW YORK
As Winston Churchill said of his successor Clement Attlee, Ban Ki-Moon is a very modest man. It remains to be seen whether the United Nations Secretary-General also has ‘much to be modest about’. As the traditional hundred-day deadline for assessing new office-holders approaches, there is a quite remarkable lack of information on which to base any assessment. Ban shows no sign of rushing. With unprecedented time to effect a transition, he could have started running with a full team – unless he was waiting for former United States Ambassador John Bolton to go.
Ban Ki-moon brought a team of Koreans with him to the United Nations, seven according to most reports, regardless of his official nominations to office. Most notable is Kim Won-soo who was the mastermind of Ban’s election campaign to become Secretary-General. Now officially the assistant to newly appointed chef de cabinet Vijay Nambiar, UN staff report that Kim is no eminence grise, but is indeed very openly assertive in his authority.
But neither he nor his compatriots at UN headquarters are open about much else. Neither Ban nor his team have taken any great pains to explain themselves to senior staff, let alone to the media and the public.
Consequently, no one can be sure how deeply in debt Ban feels to the Americans for their electoral support, or indeed whether the nature of any such obligation has changed with the removal of Ambassador John Bolton and the change of control in Congress.
Spoils System
Ban’s appointment of B. Lynn Pascoe, a veteran United States diplomat, to head the Department of Political Affairs sent one sign. But his retreat from plans to put the substantive part of the peacekeeping department under the American, and his refinement of original proposals to downgrade disarmament affairs could be a joint product of a change of emphasis in Washington, or resistance from other member states.
Pascoe is an accomplished diplomat, well versed in Asian affairs, who even speaks Mandarin. If it had to be an American, then he is possibly the best for the position. Nonetheless, having an American, or for that matter, in the current state of the relationship between British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George Bush, a British nominee in such a crucial position, is bad for the UN and for Washington.
Despite its churlish lack of public enthusiasm, the US relies increasingly on the UN for major parts of global policing that would otherwise consume its increasingly challenged resources. And
one of the advantages of the UN is that its global legitimacy gives it an appearance of neutrality that Pascoe’s presence may belie.
The Security Council permanent members’ spoils system as applied to senior UN positions has led traditionally to a reliance on a kitchen cabinet of people you can trust. However, in Ban’s case, these all seem to be Korean. Senior UN staff report that insofar as the Korean team has manifested an agenda, it is ‘reform’, which it is pursuing with singular intensity – and on which it also seems to be taking advice from the Americans, although it is certainly a personal preoccupation of Ban’s.
Reform Rhetoric
Following an American reform agenda could be very frustrating since the Humpty Dumpty principle applies, ‘When I use a word, it means just what I want it to mean, neither more nor less’. For significant constituencies in Washington, reform means that the organisation will do what it is told, when it is told, by the US. In particular it would be expected to drop its traditional support for international law in the Middle East, particularly the Palestinian rights programmes.
One indication of trouble ahead is indeed the Middle East. Retiring Secretary-General Kofi Annan got scant thanks for trying hard to engage Israel in the organisation, without abandoning the Palestinian case in international law and the catalogue of UN decisions. There are some indications that Ban is not overly concerned about the latter, and by being somewhat over-receptive to Washington’s input, is heading for a confrontation with Arab and Islamic states and their non-aligned allies. In the UN version of Kremlinology, it was regarded as significant that Israel steered him away from going to Gaza during his March visit.
The Group of 77 developing nations are, with some justice, concerned because they know the American political agenda lurking beneath the managerial reform rhetoric. Bolton could hardly be accused of hiding it! Many would prefer an inefficient status quo in which their concerns will be addressed, to an efficient machine that excludes their agenda.
It must also be admitted that for a developing country ambassador, the prospects of a reincarnated career in the UN also looms large in the calculations. They know how to work the present system and would not welcome a slimmed down meritocracy they suspect would be under western control.
Tactical not Technocratic
Ban has tried to pre-emptively head off their opposition to his plans with senior appointments carefully spread around the global south. Many people suspect that, unless he has seen hidden depths unobserved by others in some of his appointees, a number of selections have been more tactical than technocratic.
Very late in his second term, Annan went to the long neglected root of the rot in the UN’s personnel system – and even then only after appointing Anne
Veneman, the White House nominee to head the traditional American fiefdom of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to avert US opposition.
Briefly the UN advertised and conducted a passable search process for candidates for senior positions, for example choosing Kemal Dervis of Turkey for the traditional Anglo-Saxon realm of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). And then right at the end, under heavy White House pressure, after consulting Ban, Annan appointed a Bush nominee, Josette Sheeran Shiner as head of the World Food Programme. She is a former editor of the Moony-owned Washington Times.
Following that, Ban abandoned this brief burst of genuine reform and has chosen a series of candidates who appear to represent pay-offs to powers that could have, but did not, veto his candidacy. Despite a reform pledge to cycle anyone more than five years in one position, he reappointed the French candidate, Jean-Marie Guéhenno as head of peacekeeping.
Sir John Holmes, a Blair nominee, became head of the Department of Humanitarian Affairs, a task in which he may succeed, but for which he is less qualified than the political affairs job the
British hoped for. And of course the reason that London had to accept a consolation prize was the most significant pay-back of all, Pascoe. It may be reform, but hardly root and branch.
Short on Substance
So what are Ban’s prospects? Any Secretary-General has to balance the aspirations of the bulk of the membership and the imperious demands of the great powers, in particular the US. Annan was extremely adept at this, for which he was rewarded with mutterings from the nonaligned that he was an American puppet and a two year campaign of vilification from US conservatives.
The Bush administration policy was ‘Bear not false witness: let the lie/Have time on its own wings to fly’. The White House did not start the slanderous campaign about the failures of the Iraq Oil for Food Programme, but it certainly did nothing to rein it in, and took advantage of Annan's weakened position. Ban should learn the lesson that that American support lasts only
until the first disagreement.
Some observers, unimpressed by Ban’s approach, and perhaps irritated by his own boast to the title of the ‘slippery eel’, for his avoidance of substance, have assumed he is the lacklustre product of a
backroom fix. But that is no truer than of any of his predecessors.
Indeed, while last year’s voting itself had all the transparency of a papal conclave, the campaign was unprecedentedly open, and Ban acquitted himself well on the hustings. For example, when asked about the International Criminal Court, and the doctrine of Responsibility to Protect, he declared himself unequivocally in favour of both – even though one was hardly designed to woo Bolton’s vote, while the other was not exactly what Beijing may have wanted.
Like Annan, Ban is personally very affable and approachable, but quietly spoken, and has given evidence of strong ethics. No one could be foreign minister of a fulcrum state like South Korea without developing Annan-like skills at tightrope walking. In recent years South Korea has contrived to loyally disagree with Washington even though its survival has depended on American military support. Indeed, the few hints we see of his decision-making suggest some very intricate balancing acts.
Annan, more than any recent Secretary-General realised that in the absence of serious military or financial power, careful cultivation of a public persona of trustworthy moral authority provided the best substitute. Despite indifferent speaking skills, and very carefully weighing every word, he was
initially very successful in this.
One way in which Annan succeeded was to open up the organisation to the media in an unprecedented way. Previously, staff rules forbade talking to the press, but he reversed the position so that they were mandated to do so on areas in which they had competence. He also surrounded himself with a team that could articulately fill in the gaps in his diplomatically constrained public discussion.
It is to be hoped that Ban may begin to realise what he is missing. There is no point in having the world’s most prominent bully pulpit if he is not prepared to read the occasional sermon and deliver some ringing ex cathedra judgments. He will find that soft power is the strongest weapon in his armoury.
IAN WILLIAMS is Editor of the forthcoming Guide to the UN, published
by CQ Press
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
The plot in favour of America
As promised, here is my Guardian Comment is Free post
The editors asked the question, you will note that I did not answer it - insufficient data!
Ian
The plot in favour of America
Does Ban Ki-Moon's latest appointment put truth on the rumours of a US-dominated United Nations?
Ian Williams
February 13, 2007 9:45 PM | Printable version
Ban Ki-Moon has finished six weeks as secretary-general of the United Nations. At a similar stage in Kofi Annan's career, Sergei Lavrov, the mordantly witty Foreign Minister of Russia and then ambassador to the UN, asked him why he had not completed his reforms, since the Almighty only took six days to complete the Universe. In one of his infrequent but sharp retorts, Annan pointed out that God did it on his own, without the interference of 190 members.
In reality, most of those 190 have little individual voice - but the permanent five members of the security council and, above all, the US certainly do. In that context, Ban's confirmation or the rumours that he is appointing the US ambassador to Indonesia, Lynn Pascoe, to head the UN's department of political affairs, could be disastrous.
That is no personal comment on Ambassador Pascoe, who is an accomplished diplomat well versed in Asian affairs, and even speaks Mandarin. If it had to be an American then he was a much better choice than, say, John Bolton.
Presumably Ban, in his previous incarnation as South Korean foreign minister had already become professionally acquainted with Pascoe. One can imagine a trade-off: American insistence that an American get the job, but Ban picking one he felt comfortable with. But no-one should have put him in that position.
Having any American, or for that matter, in the current state of the Blair-Bush relationship, any British appointee, in such a crucial position, is bad for the UN and for Washington. Even if Pascoe does not keep his fingers crossed behind his back when he takes his oath as an international civil servant, swearing that he "shall not seek or receive instructions from any government or from any other authority external to the Organization," who is going to believe him?
When Washington talks about reform and efficiency of the UN it is like Humpty Dumpty - the words mean just what the White House want them to mean, neither more nor less. Humpty Dumpty's great fall in Iraq is strongly persuasive to the rest of the UN membership that little this administration says or does can be put back together into any close proximity to reality. To mention but one important question, will Ambassador Pascoe implement UN resolutions on the Middle East, or for that matter on issues like Western Sahara?
Of course, he may, but Washington wouldn't like it, he will have a huge credibility gap to surmount with the rest of the membership and any hopes of a career in American politics go up in smoke. Yet without heroic efforts on Pascoe's part to establish himself as thoroughly un-American, the UN's every move will now suffer from the perception of being another American plot, which is bad for America.
In fact, the rhetoric and snide asides from the Washington aside, the US has been calling on the UN more than ever before: between African peacekeeping operations, putting pressure on Sudan, on Iran and many other diplomatic initiatives. The appearance of global diplomatic consensus that UN action gives has been far more legitimizing than unilateral decrees from the White House. But the cover is now blown. If Pascoe gets involved in Sudan, then he will be depicted as an envoy of the Crusaders in Washington.
Insofar as reforms mean anything at the UN, it has to be about personnel, where a combination of big power pressure, smaller power diplomatic nepotism, and the most renownedly inefficient and politicized "human resources" department conceivable have perpetuated the situation that a former secretary-general, Perez de Cuellar, epitomized when asked how many people work at the UN. "About half," he replied.
At the core of that is the permanent five's presumption, since the organization was founded, that they could appoint the senior staff of the UN. While Pascoe has to be an improvement over the KGB appointees that Moscow used to foist in the same position before the end of the Cold War, the job is now far more important than providing hard currency and information for a beleaguered Soviet Union.
Very belatedly, in his last term, Kofi Annan began to tackle this, and began a respectable search for candidates for senior posts. And then right at the end, under heavy White House pressure he appointed, after consulting Ban, a Bush appointee Josette Sheeran Shiner, a former editor of the Moony-owned Washington Times, as head of the World Food Programme.
Ban also appointed Sir John Holmes, a chum of Tony Blair as head of the department of humanitarian affairs, a task in which he may succeed. But governments that prate about "reform" should have the decency to blush when they make the UN part of their domestic spoils system.
If there is any ironic satisfaction, it is that UN staff are complaining that no matter who gets what job, the decisions will be taken by one of the Korean kitchen cabinet that Ban Ki-Moon has brought with him. Comparing Seoul's recent foreign policy with Washington's, that is actually reassuring.
The editors asked the question, you will note that I did not answer it - insufficient data!
Ian
The plot in favour of America
Does Ban Ki-Moon's latest appointment put truth on the rumours of a US-dominated United Nations?
Ian Williams
February 13, 2007 9:45 PM | Printable version
Ban Ki-Moon has finished six weeks as secretary-general of the United Nations. At a similar stage in Kofi Annan's career, Sergei Lavrov, the mordantly witty Foreign Minister of Russia and then ambassador to the UN, asked him why he had not completed his reforms, since the Almighty only took six days to complete the Universe. In one of his infrequent but sharp retorts, Annan pointed out that God did it on his own, without the interference of 190 members.
In reality, most of those 190 have little individual voice - but the permanent five members of the security council and, above all, the US certainly do. In that context, Ban's confirmation or the rumours that he is appointing the US ambassador to Indonesia, Lynn Pascoe, to head the UN's department of political affairs, could be disastrous.
That is no personal comment on Ambassador Pascoe, who is an accomplished diplomat well versed in Asian affairs, and even speaks Mandarin. If it had to be an American then he was a much better choice than, say, John Bolton.
Presumably Ban, in his previous incarnation as South Korean foreign minister had already become professionally acquainted with Pascoe. One can imagine a trade-off: American insistence that an American get the job, but Ban picking one he felt comfortable with. But no-one should have put him in that position.
Having any American, or for that matter, in the current state of the Blair-Bush relationship, any British appointee, in such a crucial position, is bad for the UN and for Washington. Even if Pascoe does not keep his fingers crossed behind his back when he takes his oath as an international civil servant, swearing that he "shall not seek or receive instructions from any government or from any other authority external to the Organization," who is going to believe him?
When Washington talks about reform and efficiency of the UN it is like Humpty Dumpty - the words mean just what the White House want them to mean, neither more nor less. Humpty Dumpty's great fall in Iraq is strongly persuasive to the rest of the UN membership that little this administration says or does can be put back together into any close proximity to reality. To mention but one important question, will Ambassador Pascoe implement UN resolutions on the Middle East, or for that matter on issues like Western Sahara?
Of course, he may, but Washington wouldn't like it, he will have a huge credibility gap to surmount with the rest of the membership and any hopes of a career in American politics go up in smoke. Yet without heroic efforts on Pascoe's part to establish himself as thoroughly un-American, the UN's every move will now suffer from the perception of being another American plot, which is bad for America.
In fact, the rhetoric and snide asides from the Washington aside, the US has been calling on the UN more than ever before: between African peacekeeping operations, putting pressure on Sudan, on Iran and many other diplomatic initiatives. The appearance of global diplomatic consensus that UN action gives has been far more legitimizing than unilateral decrees from the White House. But the cover is now blown. If Pascoe gets involved in Sudan, then he will be depicted as an envoy of the Crusaders in Washington.
Insofar as reforms mean anything at the UN, it has to be about personnel, where a combination of big power pressure, smaller power diplomatic nepotism, and the most renownedly inefficient and politicized "human resources" department conceivable have perpetuated the situation that a former secretary-general, Perez de Cuellar, epitomized when asked how many people work at the UN. "About half," he replied.
At the core of that is the permanent five's presumption, since the organization was founded, that they could appoint the senior staff of the UN. While Pascoe has to be an improvement over the KGB appointees that Moscow used to foist in the same position before the end of the Cold War, the job is now far more important than providing hard currency and information for a beleaguered Soviet Union.
Very belatedly, in his last term, Kofi Annan began to tackle this, and began a respectable search for candidates for senior posts. And then right at the end, under heavy White House pressure he appointed, after consulting Ban, a Bush appointee Josette Sheeran Shiner, a former editor of the Moony-owned Washington Times, as head of the World Food Programme.
Ban also appointed Sir John Holmes, a chum of Tony Blair as head of the department of humanitarian affairs, a task in which he may succeed. But governments that prate about "reform" should have the decency to blush when they make the UN part of their domestic spoils system.
If there is any ironic satisfaction, it is that UN staff are complaining that no matter who gets what job, the decisions will be taken by one of the Korean kitchen cabinet that Ban Ki-Moon has brought with him. Comparing Seoul's recent foreign policy with Washington's, that is actually reassuring.
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