United Nations in A Changing World
By Kazi Anwarul Masud
Immanuel Kant’s proposal for the formation of a federation or “League” of the world’s nations which would allow countries to unite and punish any nation guilty of an act of aggression through what is sometimes referred to as collective security briefly came to life when the League of Nations was formed. But the League failed to live up to the Kantian expectation of a federation that would protect the rights of small nations who get caught in the power struggle of bigger nations mainly because several of the major countries, notably the United States, were not members while others who were members failed to oppose the aggressions by Japan, Germany and Italy which caused the outbreak of the Second World War.
In 1942 twenty-two nations’ coalition against German-Japanese-Italian axis powers signed a Declaration of the United Nations (the name coined by President Franklin Roosevelt) accepting the principles of the Atlantic Charter (earlier signed by Roosevelt and Winston Churchill.). A year later four war time alliesthe US, Britain, the Soviet Union and Chinaagreed to establish an international organization which eventually became the United Nations in October 1945.
This sojourn into history was necessary to comprehend fully the frustration and restlessness that has gripped the international community following the apparent failure of the United Nations to prevent intervention in Kosovo (though generally supported by the world at large except legal orthodox) and aggression on Iraq (described as an unjust war by the international community ). The essence of both the League of Nations and the UN lay in the universal expectation for security from aggression by others.
It is not true that the paralysis of the UN has suddenly been discovered in the post-Cold War era. Indeed the invocation of article 51 of the UN Charter which provided for “ the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against member of the United Nations” as a justification of the establishment of NATO notwithstanding; the real cause behind NATO’s birth was the protection of “our cherished freedoms” (in the words of John Foster Dulles) with military defense, religious faith and demonstration of western political and social system as counter-attraction to Communism. Inherent in this western move was their belief in the inadequacy of the UN security system and the paralysis of the Security Council caused by the use of veto powers by the USSR.
In the 1946-89 period out of 232 vetoes cast 113 were cast by the USSR as against 68 by the US, 29 by Britain, and 18 by France. Most of the Soviet vetoes were cast at the initial period of the UN. This led Canada’s Lester Pearson to conclude that “development within the UN itself and partly because of the menacing state of affairs which has developed in the world” the UN clearly was not capable of meeting the threat to international peace and security which the western powers felt was gathering at that time (1949).
If the UN Charter were to be considered as the constitution of the world committed to the maintenance of international peace and security with the Security Council given the responsibility to determine the existence of any threat to peace and decide on measures to suppress international lawlessness then any departure from the normative doctrine of international peace causes international concern. This concern becomes palpable as strain increases between the forces trying to guard against any attack on nation-state sovereignty as against the doctrine of human security enunciated in the mid-1990s by the Commission on Global Governance by refusing to confine the concept of security exclusively to the protection of states ignoring the interests of the people in whose name sovereignty is exercised.
Additional strain has been put by an era of globalization turning into an era of American-westernization of international concerns. Kofi Anan alluded to this strain in the Hague Appeal for Peace in 1999 by expressing his worry at “the inability of states to reconcile national interests when skillful and visionary diplomacy would make unity possible”. He urged for the revision of the concept of national interest that has failed to keep in step with the profound global changes following the end of the Cold War.
Kofi Anan’s appeal was for subordinating national interest-guided policy to the rule of law. But the terrorist attacks of 9/11 changed irreversibly any American pretension to subject its actions to the dictates of international law. This was made abundantly clear by then President Bush in September 2002 when he declared his determination to seek unilateral redress should the UN fail to act to meet then perceived twin threat of terrorism and of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). I n his quest to punish the perpetrators of 9/11 attacks President Bush received solidarist support of the American people and of the international community.
So when the Talibans were driven out the entire world either applauded or acquiesced with NATO assault led by the US on Afghanistan though it was the first time that NATO’s operation was out of the traditionally accepted area regarded as “out-of-the-area” operation. This became obligatory as NATO for the first time in its history invoked article 5 of its charter that effectively translated 9/11 attacks on the US as attack on all NATO members. Besides Afghanistan war could be construed as having UNSC blessings because the Security Council had established that terrorists may be considered as agents of the state that harbor them and made it illegal to sponsor or shelter terrorists. So the Taliban regime’s refusal to hand over Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida network to the international community made Afghanistan vulnerable to international reprisal.
In Kosovo case, however, UNSC paralysis due to veto threat from Russia and China necessitating NATO intervention called into question UNSC capacity to perform its functions and revived anew the debate for its reforms. Reforms suggested are basically the following: - (a) an increase in the number of elected members retaining the five permanent members; (b) two more permanent members (Japan and Germany) and three more elected from Asia, Africa and Latin America; and (c) “semi-permanent members” with no veto power.
There is almost universal appreciation of the fact that the present composition of the UNSC and veto power of P-5 reflective of the situation following the Second World War needs reforms. Former UNSG Butros Ghali observed in his Agenda for Democratization that the UN had little moral authority to preach democracy to the outside world when it was not practicing it in its own backyard. It is often pointed out that four out of five permanent members are “European” (a concept that includes the US) and “industrialized” countries, the latter argument that goes against Japan’s inclusion while in its entirety the argument works against Germany. Besides, Argentina, Mexico and Pakistan question the choice of Brazil and India to be taken in as permanent members.
Despite differences over future composition of the UNSC among member states its democratization is essential to arrest the increasing trend towards unilateralism. One has to bear in mind President Bush’s warning of the UN becoming irrelevant if it failed to act on Iraq as of the US Congress resolution on Sudan urging Bush administration to act unilaterally in the UN failed to act to meet the humanitarian disaster in Darfur. Kofi Anan’s mild chastisement of President Bush that only the UN can lend unique legitimacy to military intervention fell on deaf ears of the Bush administration. But then one must recognize the fact of irreversible change in the global construct in the post-Cold War era in terms of nation-state’s responsibility not only in its conduct of inter-state relations but also its treatment of its own people for retaining sovereignty.
Addressing the World policy Conference at in Morocco in October UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon stressed that global governance was too important to be left to just one organization or group. But, he said, “United Nationswith its universality, experience and operational presence in nearly every countrywhere global governance can best come together. The United Nations is the right place provided we ourselves keep pace. This means performancetimely and accountable. And it means reforming the UN bodies….the Security Council membership should reflect today’s realities, not those of many decades ago”. Ban ki-Moon’s emphasis on global governance is driven by emergence of new economic powers, new challenges transcending borders that no country or group can tackle. The world needs equity and sustainable development, attainment of Millennium Development Goals, facing the challenges of climate change, energy crisis, food crisis, populations migration, pandemics, terrorism.
In this context Tony Blair’s enunciation of the Doctrine of International Community (in April 1999) becomes relevant. Referring to Kosovo as a just war based not on territorial ambition but on values, Blair’s doctrine contained the explicit recognition that states nowadays were mutually dependent and the national interests of states were to a significant degree governed by international collaboration. Blair’s doctrine is essentially aimed at breaking down insularity of states and furthering politico-economic collaboration among states based on the values of liberty, democracy, and the rule of law, human rights, and an open society. This automatically meant that dictators every where were put on notice that their minority rule, ethnic cleansing, undemocratic rule (in many countries of the world) were not acceptable and the international community (mainly the West) would not stand idly by while disharmonious domestic rule and aberrant international conduct continued unabated. Tony Blair had no doubts in his mind that intervention in Kosovo was just and delayed action in Rwanda was an unforgivable moral lapse. His doctrine was not meant to be confined to Europe or the West but would have universal applicability. It was obvious that in the application of this doctrine the instrument of humanitarian intervention would be necessary.
Tony Blair was, however, acutely aware of the centrality of the UN in this quest for a world ruled by law and international cooperation. But for the UN to play a central role the organization and particularly the Security Council had to be reformed enabling it to respond effectively to the challenges of the Twenty First century. Blair allowed that for too long non-intervention has remained inviolable and sacrosanct in the UN Charter. And he argued that acts of genocide and large scale abuse of human rights producing massive flow of refuges (from then East Pakistan into adjoining states of India and from Darfur into Chad) could be described as threat to international peace and security. Therefore the UN Charter needed to be amended to include humanitarian grounds as part of international law sanctioning intervention in serious cases.
As globalization is blurring the traditional inter-state boundaries and increasing interdependence at the intra and inter-state levels the need for the promotion of global democracy has gained paramount importance. Conventional wisdom tells us that democracies do not wage wars against one another. The reason for this reticence in the use of force is not difficult to find. As opposed to totalitarian regimes the checks and balances inherent in the democratic societies control the impulse of a single or a group of individuals to opt for conflict. Such a Kantian world of perpetual peace would have been idyllic to live in. But since the world is divided into many segments ranging from post-industrial to pre-industrial societies, the issue at stake is who best can promote global democracy.
The UN with its legitimacy and perceived impartiality becomes an instant candidate. But since the seeds of democratic culture have to be nurtured by indigenous forces the UN can only provide assistance in the building of democratic institutions. Dictation of democratic culture by exogenous forces/actors is generally faced with obstruction because the target countries perceive it as attack on their sovereignty. This strand of reasoning is further strengthened by former National Security Advisor Sandy Burger’s observation that President Bush’s speech urging political freedom in Muslim countries was met with skepticism and disdain. Across the Middle East, Sandy Burger added, President Bush’s words did little to improve popular perception about the US as a bully and its pronouncements as hypocritical.
Besides the Iraq war has demonstrated that the world at large is still reluctant to see neighboring dictators being toppled since many rulers guilty of similar sins and living in glass houses are hesitant to cast stones upon the guilty. They take comfort in the security blanket provided in the facts that the Iraq war without UN sanction not only violated the salience of the UN Charter but also provisions of international law which as ratified treaties are also part of the “supreme law of the land” according to the US Constitution.
Critics of Iraq war refuse to give Anglo-US misadventure legitimacy because of the absence of plausible and imminent Iraqi threat to international peace and security (thus refusing to accept Bush doctrine of preemption) and further accuse President Bush of having decided on regime change in Iraq long before he became President of USA. American muscularity has also been criticized on the ground of use of excessive force that is contrary to the principle of proportionality usually followed in just war. Maarti Ahari, former Finnish President had observed that Iraq had already been bombed to a pre-industrial age during the First Gulf War and the subsequent bombardment must have resulted in considerable death and destruction. Iraq episode is generally recognized as a failure of the UN system in the face of American unipolarity.
Regardless of one’s preference or lack of it relating to unquestionable American preeminence in the present global construct realism dictates that international efforts be directed to induce the US to follow a strategy of partnership. President Obama’s speech at the UNGA has signaled the change from hard to soft power by the US. Though bulk of his speech was focused on the Palestine issue his forceful support of human rights and denunciation of tyranny and call for the world to come together development is a welcome departure from the muscularity of the Bush era. Multilateralism has come back. US allies would be treated as equal and not as Tony Blair once lamented as “servants” to carry out US dictates.
President Obama realizes the global preference for the UN over the US because American muscularity has not united rather has divided the world into sharply distinct camps. The global preference mentioned earlier found support in Anne-Marie Slaughter’s (of Princeton University) and now Director of Policy Planning at the US State Department observation that UNSC remains the preferred destination for undertaking collective actions because legitimacy and weight of preventive measures endorsed by the UN makes it easier to carry them out. She, however, advocates that in the case of UNSC paralysis the next step should be the regional organization that is most likely to be affected by the emerging threat (e.g. African Union in the Darfur crisis case). Failing which, Slaughter argues, organizations like NATO that may have less direct connection with the emerging threat but has a better cohesive body and resources to encounter the threat should be considered. Only after these options have been exhausted, Anne-Marie Slaughter would consider unilateral action or action by a coalition of the willing.
Given universal recognition of shifting threats from identifiable nation-states to shadowy non-state actors who may be endowed with WMD capability to be used for terrorist purposes, the need for reforms of the UN system can hardly be overstated. It has been argued that in line with the pronouncement by the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty of the principle of “the responsibility to protect” victims of massive violation of human rights, genocide, famine or anarchy, the international community, acting through the UN should adopt a collective duty to prevent nations running without internal checks from acquiring or using weapons of mass destruction.
Equally after the Cold War as more and more states got willing to look with severity and with less tolerance at other states whose treatment of their own citizens do not measure up to a common minimum standard demanded by democratic system of governance, the principle of humanitarian intervention denied by the UN Charter needed to be revised.
The tragic events of 9/11 added impetus to western quest for democratic governance in countries still under authoritarian/ oligarchic rule where citizens attracted to western political model acutely feel its absence in their own countries where autocratic rulers were tolerated in the past by the West because of strategic reasons (continued supply of oil and/or continuance of military bases) and by their own citizenry due to welfare state provisions made by the rulers. But the gradual erosion of welfare facilities provided by the state has given rise to frustration among the people who now have neither the affluence nor the liberal system that they aspire to have.
Such frustration has proved to be fertile ground for recruitment of al-Qaedist elements to the detriment of both the West and the rulers of these islands of autocracy. It is, therefore, not illogical if the western powers having learnt the lethal lessons of 9/11 and other terrorist assaults on their soil were to insist on reforms of the UN system to facilitate their pursuit of emerging threats. But their insistence should be tinged with understanding of the existential differences between civilizations and hence prudential policies should be followed.
If Iraq experience is anything to go by then the US should not be overly enthusiastic about the immediate success of its Greater Middle East Initiative. Rulers of many of these countries are used to being “elected” by overwhelming majority of votes in choreographed elections and staying in power for decades. These rulers and the privileged class which have grown around them are unlikely to abdicate the power and privilege they have been enjoying for so long just because the Americans suddenly have had a change of heart to restore democracy in these foreign lands. Besides there is no guarantee that the replacements chosen through flawed system would be any better than the tyrants they replaced. At present western concern with Africa relates more to containing AIDS epidemic than bad governance (Zimbabwe is an exception) per se. Their main concern relates to the Islamic world that somehow refuses to embrace the libertarian values seen by many Islamists as repugnant to the fundamental teachings of Islam.
In this context historian Bernard Lewis’ controversial observation that democracy is a parochial custom of the English-speaking people for the conduct of their public affairs that may or may not be suitable for others may be noted.
The first port of call of all decolonized nations was usually the United Nations seeking its membership that gave these countries legitimacy as members of the international community and also gave them assurances of security and territorial inviolability from possible attack by predatory states. The independence wave in the years following the Second World War, the second according to Samuel Huntington and Larry Diamondthe first wave being those gaining independence after the First World War and the third wave being those democracies achieved following the dissolution of Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union-- was one of the inevitable consequences of the War as it was fought in the name of occupied humanity who had to be freed and occupiers had to be defeated.
Some concerns were, however, expressed as to the suitability of giving independence to some of the colonies on the ground they might not have both the societal values and the institutions necessary for the successful functioning of an independent state. In any case the Dumbarton Oaks Conference (1944) and the subsequent San Francisco Conference (1945) deliberated on the formation of a new international order based on universal respect for human rights. During the deliberations the Soviet proposal for a reference to the right of self-determination of peoples initially opposed by the US, UK and France was subsequently included in the Charter. Perhaps the most important assertion in favor of decolonization was UNGA’s resolution of December 1960 which proclaimed “the necessity of bringing to speedy and unconditional end colonialism in all its forms and manifestations because the subjection of peoples to alien subjection, domination and exploitation was a denial of human rights, contrary to UN Charter and an impediment to international peace and development”. This overwhelming moral demand on colonizers to free people from domination was generally heeded and consequently the membership of the UN grew at exponential rate.
In the case of Bangladesh which was not a colony of a foreign power in the traditional sense and whose independence was gained through a bloody war of liberation her relationship with the United Nations was forged in steel long before the country formally became a member of the UN. The story of her caesarian birth has been told in countless books. One outstanding account of our fight for freedom in the corridors and chambers of the United Nations has been detailed by an Indian diplomat. He described how despite Indian Foreign Minister Sardar Swaran Singh’s spirited advocacy of the East Pakistan crisis (in Sept-Oct 1971) in UNGA in seeking UN support most of the countries did not recognize the political aspect of the crisis and support the liberation struggle and the consequent fragmentation of Pakistan. These countries were willing to recognize the humanitarian aspect of the crisis. Even during the dying days of Pakistan on the eastern front the US, Britain and France in the UNSC “urged an immediate ceasefire and resumption of political dialogue. None of these members addressed the basic cause of the crisis, namely, the non-fulfillment of the legitimate political verdict given by the people of Bangladesh”.
Bangladesh owes a debt of gratitude to the former Soviet Union, among others, because had it not been for the Soviet veto (cast seven times in our favor in December 1971) President Nixon’s pro Pakistan tilt would have found expression in the UNSC aborting our freedom struggle. But the surrender of the Pakistani occupation army did not automatically grant Bangladesh UN membership. The legal hurdle of the right of secession only by a “people” and not by an “ethnic group” had to be overcome.
The International Commission of Jurists set up in 1972 to investigate the events of East Pakistan found that by 1970 the population of East Pakistan had constituted a separate “people”. The admission of Bangladesh into the UN, wrote Thomas Musgrave, as a sovereign and independent state constituted implicit recognition by the UNGA that the Bengalese was a people since only a people could freely determine its own political status. Besides, international law recognizes a continuum of remedies ranging from protection of individuals to minority rights ending with secession as the ultimate remedy. At a certain point the severity of a state’s treatment of its minority becomes a matter of international concern. This concern may finally involve an international legitimation of a right of secessionist self-determination (Lee BuehheitSecession 1978). This is known as the “oppression theory” which was used to justify the secession of Bangladesh from Pakistan.
The recognition of Bangladesh as an independent country by the UN gave validity to the “oppression theory” as a basis for secession. But then Bangladesh could very well been a rare case at that time if one were to look back at Biafra that failed to get international support due to the insistence by the African orthodoxy that only former colonies were entitled to be sovereign and independent states. Later, however, different formulas had to be set by the EU and the US for recognition of new independent states following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia as on the occasion of peaceful separation of the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
After meeting the political and legal criteria set by the international community on 17th September 1974 Bangladesh took its seat as a member of the UN and has since then met her obligations expected of a responsible member. Twice Bangladesh was elected as a non-permanent member of the UNSC that reflected the growing confidence of the international community in Bangladesh... Like all small nations Bangladesh wants a world based on the rule of law partly because it lacks the military and economic might to withstand Hobbes an state of nature where there is continual fear of danger and violent death and partly because of the country’s aspiration to be counted as one in which the rule of law prevails. The fear of possible encroachment on her sovereignty, an encroachment not based on international law derived from global morality drawing force from solidarist approach of declaratory law but based on perceived “aggressor’s selfish interests could have played an important role in the foreign and defense policy of Bangladesh and her inflexible faith in the UN Charter and the UN System.
Bangladesh is acutely aware of global turmoil resulting from preemption and unilateral action as an option for security, targeting Islamic radicalism and its fall out of religious profiling. Bangladesh discounts any possibility of the UN becoming irrelevant because of its universality; inability of any one state to meet the intricate and inter-locking economic, monetary, financial and trade related problems arising out of globalization; and no less importantly as the legitimacy of the UN is founded on the principles of international law. Bangladesh regrets the slow progress in the achievement of Millennial Development Goals and “unacceptable and unconscionable” decline in aid flow to least developed countries.
Bangladesh’s impressive record of participating in 25 out of 53 UN peace keeping missions and now serving in 10 out of 16 on-going missions (additionally providing force commanders for UN peace keeping force in Mozambique and Georgia) should be read as the country’s expression of unstinted support of the UN Charter. On the occasion of the UN Day which we are observing today I would like to say a few words about UN peace keeping which, perhaps, is one of the most important functions performed by the United Nations and Bangladesh can proudly claim to be the largest contributor to the UN peace keeping family.
Interestingly the term peacekeeping does not exist in the UN Charter. Dag Hammarskjold referred to it as belonging to “Chapter VI and Half” of the UN Carter because Chapter six provided for mediation and fact finding while Chapter seven provided for more forceful measures such as embargoes and military intervention. UN peacekeeping has been described as non-aggressive use of military force to help nations in conflict to reach a settlement. The peacekeepers play a neutral role by going into a conflict area as observers to ensure that agreements reached between combatants are being followed. They can provide a buffer zone between warring parties by physically interposing themselves in the middle. They can negotiate with military leaders on both sides and thus provide a channel of communication.
The United Nations Security Council authorizes the deployment of peacekeeping forces and determines its mandate. The guidelines for peacekeeping force established by Dag Hammarskjold so many years ago still remains valid. Under the guidelines the UN forces may only initiate peacekeeping activities if the parties to the conflict agree to their presence; the troops may not use violence but only negotiation to accomplish their mission; the troops must serve under the exclusive command of the UNSC; all member nations must financially support the peace operations; and the peacekeeping force can only fire in self-defense.
It has been argued that peacemaking, peacekeeping and humanitarian activities reflect failures in world politics. The nature of peacekeeping has already been described. Peace building refers to measures taken in the transition from war to peace including support structures minimizing the chances of return to violence. Humanitarianism is neutral, impartial and non-coercive method of alleviating human suffering .It is generally believed that conflict zones needing peacekeeping operations by the UN are generally located in the Souththe underdeveloped regions of the world who become victims of civil wars and disasters either man-made or naturaland those who organize the intervening are mainly from industrial North. Paradoxically the states that would have benefited from international humanitarian operations were often the ones opposing these operations
Brahimi Report’s, produced by the UN panel set up after UN inaction resulting in massacre at Srebrenica and genocide at Rwanda, recommendations, interalia, of enhanced UN capacities for peacekeeping was seen by some of the Southern governments as a Trojan horse for rampant intervention by the North. Even though the Brahimi Report was broadly welcomed by the Millennium Summit and endorsed by the UNSC Summit (2000) its critics saw the attention given to peacekeeping as distraction from priority that should have been given to social and economic issues. Besides the report’s suggestion that stronger and more centralized analytical capacity was needed for conflict prevention and management as being potentially intrusive in their domestic affairs worried some Southern governments. This Southern wariness can be explained by their apprehension of greater chances of unanimity among P-5 due to disappearance of Cold War bipolarity; greater awareness of G-8 countries of global interdependence and that democracy deficit in any part of the world if tolerated could fuel conflicts adversely affecting their interests; and increasing possibility of the West by-passing the UN if necessary (as in Kosovo and Iraq). Added to these newly emerging factors was the fact that over several decades UN declarations on strengthening humanitarian assistance had stressed the principle of state sovereignty and the need for consent of the state requiring humanitarian assistance.
Now, a few words of Bangladesh in the context of the UN. Bangladesh's activism along with other members had resulted in the UNGA declaration of the year 2000 as the International Year of the Culture of Peace. Bangladesh Presidency of the Security Council of March 2000 saw explosive situations in Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, East Timor, Eritrea-Ethiopia, Iraq, Sierra Leone, Congo, Somalia, Tajikistan and Western Sahara as main pre-occupation of the UNSC. Bangladesh is equally engaged in the fight against deteriorating economic situation in the least developed countries who to escape from the poverty trap has to achieve a 7% growth rate which suggests an increase in the ratio of investment to GDP by 25 per cent, an impossible target to achieve without considerable foreign investment. But then it is unrealistic to expect appreciable amount of foreign investment to flow into Bangladesh under the existing situation that is not investment friendly.
At the recent UNGA Bangladesh Prime Minister urged the developed world to discard self-centered and short sighted policy in today’s interconnected world. She estimated that Bangladesh would need 22 billion US dollars by 2015 to achieve MDG, a Magna Carta for a poverty free world. Though Bangladesh is on course to achieve poverty-free alleviation, universal primary education, gender equality and women’s empowerment and reduction of child mortality; erratic and frequently occurring natural calamities stand in the way of achieving time bound developmental goals relating to food self-sufficiency, eliminating gender disparity in education, enhancing economic participation of women by 40%, and achieving a Digital Bangladesh for global connectivity.
So far as the United Nations is concerned Bangladesh remains convinced of its indispensability as the central organ for collective management for global affairs. Bangladesh’s robust participation in many UN peacekeeping operations testifies to the country’s unshakeable faith in the UN Charter. Bangladesh strongly supports Kofi Anan’s call for strengthening the multilateral institutions and the principal organs of the UN through effective reforms representative of the aspirations and concerns of the member states, reforms not perpetuating current global imbalances and responding only to transitory phases.
Bangladesh favors India’s inclusion as a permanent member of the UNSC in line with some developed countries’ support to Indian aspiration and G-8’s consideration to expand the club into G-20 by including China and India. Such international affirmation of Indian economic and diplomatic ascent as an important player in global affairs is now being lost in the incestuous nature of regional conflict. In the ultimate analysis a resource-poor LDC like Bangladesh dependant as it is on increased foreign assistance and investment, unhindered market access and preferential treatment of its exportable; trapped in the vortex of poverty, lacking a knowledge-based society, pregnant with incipient domestic terrorism, cannot but opt for an international community whose domestic and international behavior will be subordinate to international law and civilized code of conduct. In pursuit of these goals there cannot be any other organization more suitable than the United Nations
Though the UN remains the ultimate destination for conflict resolution the myriad of problems faced by the world today makes it difficult to resolve all burning issues. In the words of Harvard University Professor Joseph Nye Jr the UN plays a crucial role in legitimation, crisis, diplomacy, peace keeping and humanitarian missions, but it’s very size has proven to be a disadvantage for many other functions. Joseph Nye cites the 2009 UN climate change summit at Copenhagen where the meeting of 192 states was unwieldy and proved to be subject of bloc politics and external influence. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said recently “the UN remains the single most important global institution ….but we are constantly reminded of its limitations...the UN was never intended to tackle every challenge nor should it”.
An example is the expansion of G-8 to G-20 in the wake of the financial crisis of 2009. Scholars have suggested that to cope with the myriad of problems that would be faced by the world on account of transnational challenges that characterize the global information revolution the world will have to develop complementary institutions that will supplement the UN framework which, we must remind ourselves, can only give legitimacy to all actions to be acceptable to the international community.
(The writer is a former Ambassador and Secretary of Bangladesh and this paper is based on the key note speech given by him at the UN day organised by the United Nations Association of Bangladesh. He can be reached at kamasud@dhaka.net)
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