Sunday Times 2
At the UN: from the sublime to the hilarious
View(s):By Thalif Deen*
UNITED NATIONS (IDN) — The primary mandate of the United Nations is to maintain international peace and security, but the world body is also a rich source of political anecdotes—from the sublime to the hilarious.
The debates and resolutions in the 15-member Security Council, the UN’s most powerful political body, also had their moments of levity going back to the 1970s.
Ambassador Jamil Baroody, the longstanding Saudi envoy to the UN (1945-79) and described as the dean of the UN diplomatic corps, was a “colourful maverick” known for his mile-long speeches.
In its obituary, the New York Times described him as a UN “landmark” who was known for his shouting matches—while holding the distinction of making one of the longest speeches in the history of the world body. But whenever he held forth at council meetings, the US ambassador was known to slip out of the chamber and return at the tail end of his speeches. When Baroody once noticed the American envoy returning to his seat, he turned to the President of the Security Council and said, “Mr. President, I noticed the honourable US representative was not in the chamber when I spoke. So, I am going to read my statement all over again—for his benefit.”
A Gemini-generated AI image
The US envoy remained uncomfortably trapped in his seat.
Meanwhile, when ambassadors and other ranking UN diplomats arrive in New York, most of them experience “culture shock,” being forced to adjust to New York City living—including food, language, and apartment living.
In the 1970s, the New York Daily News recounted the story of a newly arrived diplomat from a conflict-ridden African country who was posted to New York—considered a safe haven—following death threats against him by a rebel group in his home country.
A few weeks after his arrival, he found a note slipped under his Manhattan apartment door with an ominous message: “The exterminator will be here tomorrow.”
Panicked at the thought the rebel group had extended its reach, he was about to rush to the nearest police precinct when he accosted the clerk at the reception desk in the lobby, who told him, “Sir, the exterminator will be here not to kill diplomats, but to exterminate roaches, bedbugs, and mice.”
That was one of the first diplomatic lessons in Manhattan apartment living.
Just after a band of mercenaries tried to unsuccessfully oust the government of the Maldives in 1988, I asked a Maldivian diplomat, using military jargon, about the strength of his country’s standing army. “Standing army?” the diplomat asked with mock surprise. “We don’t even have a sitting army.”
With a population of about 250,000, back in March 1999, the Maldives was perhaps one of the few countries with no fighter planes, combat helicopters, warships, missiles, or battle tanks. As a result, the island’s fragile defences attracted a rash of freelance mercenaries and bounty hunters who tried to take over the country twice—once in 1979 and a second time in 1988.
Although both attempts failed, the Maldives refused to drop its defences. It not only initiated a proposal seeking a UN security umbrella to protect the world’s militarily vulnerable mini-states but also backed a still-evolving international convention to outlaw mercenaries.
Meanwhile, there were also sharp-witted journalists among the UN press corps, mostly members of the UN Correspondents’ Association (UNCA), representing journalists from over 70 countries.
When a Southeast Asian ambassador hosted a lunch for journalists, including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post, among others, he told us there was a reason for the lunch. “We will soon begin our two-year term as a non-permanent member of the Security Council—and we need your cooperation (read: news coverage).”
And then added, “Hey guys, remember, as the Americans say, there is no such thing as a free lunch.” A wisecracking British journalist quipped, “Ambassador, there is also no such thing as a free press.”
There was at least one instance when the president of the General Assembly, the highest policy-making body at the United Nations, was elected by the luck of a draw—following a dead heat.
With the Asian group failing to field a single candidate, the politically memorable battle took place ahead of the 36th session of the General Assembly back in 1981 when three Asian candidates contested the presidency: Ismat Kittani of Iraq, Tommy Koh of Singapore, and Kwaja Mohammed Kaiser of Bangladesh (described as the “battle of three Ks”—Kittani, Koh, and Kaiser).
On the first ballot, Kittani got 64 votes, Kaiser 46, and Koh 40. Still, Kittani was short of a required majority of the total number of members voting. On a second ballot, Kittani and Kaiser tied with 73 votes each (with 146 members present and voting).
To break the tie, the outgoing General Assembly President—Rudiger von Wechmar of Germany—drew lots, as specified in Article 21 relating to the procedures in the election of the president (and as recorded in the Repertory of Practice of the General Assembly). And the luck of the draw, based purely on chance, favoured Kittani in that unprecedented General Assembly election.
But according to a joke circulating at that time, it was rumoured that the winner was decided by the flip of a coin—but the tossed coin apparently had two heads and no tail.
A fraudulent election
at the UN?
In the State Department, US Ambassador to the UN, Richard Holbrooke (1999-2001), was known for his passionate pursuit of the US political agenda and never taking no for an answer. When Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State, he would pursue her in and out of office until she provided him with an answer or concurred with his view.
In a rare achievement, he held the position of Assistant Secretary of State for two different regions of the world (Asia from 1977 to 1981 and Europe from 1994 to 1996). Later, he was also the US Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan (2009–10) under the Obama administration.
When Holbrooke was rushed to the hospital with an aneurysm in his heart that had burst, ripping a hole in his aorta, the physician at the hospital told him to relax. “I can’t relax,” he told the doctor, “I am in charge of Afghanistan and Pakistan,” two of the most politically troubled countries in the region. Three days later, he died.
At the memorial service in Washington, DC, in January 2011 for Holbrooke, Clinton recounted an incident when she was visiting Pakistan and Holbrooke would chase her around seeking her approval for one of his proposals on Afghanistan.
At one point, Clinton told him, “Richard, do you realise you are in a woman’s toilet in Pakistan?”
And there was loud laughter during the sober memorial ceremony.
Meanwhile, Tarzie Vittachi, a renowned Sri Lankan newspaper editor and one-time deputy executive director of the UN children’s agency UNICEF, once recounted the story of an African diplomat who sought his help to get coverage in the US media for his prime minister’s address to the General Assembly. The diplomat, a friend of Vittachi’s, said the visiting African leader was planning to tell the world body his success stories in battling poverty, hunger, and HIV/AIDS. “How can I get this story into the front pages of US newspapers?” he asked.
Vittachi, then a columnist and contributing editor to Newsweek magazine, jokingly retorted, “Shoot him—and you will get the front page of every newspaper in the US.”
As the old tabloid journalistic axiom goes, “If it bleeds, it leads.”
In Islam, the sighting of the crescent MOON marks the beginning and end of the month of Ramadan, a holy month of fasting and prayer.
But in a bygone era, for some unaccountable reason, the UN seemed to be one day behind the rest of the world in celebrating Ramadan. A joke circulating at the time provided a reason for this. At the UN, it was said, the Ramadan festival really depended on the sighting of Ban Ki-moon, the frequent-flying secretary-general who was more airborne than chairborne!
(This article contains excerpts from a book on the United Nations titled “No Comment—and Don’t Quote Me on That” authored by Thalif Deen, Editor-at-Large at the Berlin-based IDN. The book is available on Amazon. The link to Amazon via the author’s website follows: https://www.rodericgrigson.com/no-comment-by-thalif-deen/)