inside the glass house

UN’s jubilee show a damp squib?
NEW YORK-- When over 170 world leaders meet for a seemingly historic UN summit in mid-September commemorating the 60th anniversary of the world body, they are expected to approve a global plan of action to help resolve some of the world's nagging political, social and economic problems.
But a proposed 38-page plan of action — labeled the "outcome document" — has proved so divisive that the summit may eventually be forced to give its blessings to a worthless piece of paper.

The much-trumpeted summit, scheduled for September 14-16, and described by Secretary-General Kofi Annan as potentially "the largest gathering of world leaders ever" — may eventually turn out to be damp squib.

The draft plan of action itself is expected to be reduced to a four or five page sanctimonious declaration expressing the hopes and aspirations of world leaders for a better future for the 21st century.

After all, the road to political and economic nirvana has always been paved with good intentions —but no concrete commitments. With no global plan of action or any hardcore pledges by world leaders, the talkfest is heading for a monumental political disaster.

The sharp division of opinion — specifically over politically-sensitive issues relating to terrorism, human rights, development assistance, genocide, unilateral military intervention, and nuclear non-proliferation — has every other member state tearing the document apart.

The controversial US Ambassador John Bolton, who once remarked that the world can best survive without a United Nations, has also taken on a hatchet job as his first assignment, after entering the UN through a backdoor because of the refusal of the US Senate to confirm his unorthodox appointment by President Bush.

Bolton's first assignment in his new job may well be to wreck the entire plan of action by trying to force radical changes in the draft document. With his call for nearly 400 deletions and/or amendments, the outcome document is as good as dead.

"Everything that can be reduced will be reduced," claims Jean Ping, the hapless President of the General Assembly, who is chairing the protracted negotiations. "But it is not just a question of editing, it is a question of fundamental issues; we still have a persistent divergence of issues," he complained last week.

"With the U.S. drive to rewrite, if not the entire draft then large sections of it, we fear that other member states — for different reasons though — will seize the opportunity to do the same," says Lene Schumacher, director of programmes at the New York-based World Federalist Movement--Institute for Global Policy.

"This late-in-the-game-push by the United States for line-by-line editing can be very damaging. It not only undermines the entire process to date, it also creates a risk of opening up a Pandora's Box again," Schumacher added.

The 132 members of the Group of 77 developing nations have also expressed reservations over the outcome document because it fails to seek strong commitments from rich nations on issues relating to official development assistance (ODA), debt relief, fair global trade rules and quota-free market access to third world exports.

At the same time, the 118 members of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), most of whom are also members of the Group of 77, are seeking to weaken the text on issues such as the proposed new Human Rights Council and the right of the Security Council to intervene militarily in global conflicts.
The United States, on the other hand, is pushing for radical management reforms and pursuing its own interests by zeroing in on nuclear non-proliferation instead of nuclear disarmament.

Annan, who continues to put a positive spin on the ongoing negotiations, says the draft outcome document "is an important step towards decisive action for halving poverty by 2015, reducing the threat of war, terrorism, and proliferation, and promoting human dignity in every corner of the world."
He said the document, "which captures important points raised by member states during months of deliberations, is a valuable guidepost for advancing development, security, and human rights."

"The world's leaders will need to move forward on all fronts to ensure an outcome that reflects the needs of all member states," he said.
If everything goes as scheduled, Annan said, they will agree on "the most far-ranging and ambitious reforms of the United Nations in its 60-year history. I pledge to assist the membership and the president (of the General Assembly) in reaching that goal," he added. But that may be in the realm of fantasy.

Although member states have agreed on a political definition of terrorism, they have failed to reach consensus on its legal definition. On the proposed Human Rights Council, there is disagreement over the size of the new body, as well as on the modalities of its working methods, and of the selection of its members.

At the same time, members are still divided over the right to use military force under the UN charter — even though most states justify such action to prevent and fight genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.

Worse still, after more than a decade of negotiations, members have also failed to reach agreement on the expansion of the Security Council. India, Japan, Germany and Brazil, which spearheaded an aggressive campaign for four permanent seats in the Security Council, may be on the verge of abandoning their plans.

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