By MOHAMED
CHEBARO
As world leaders meet in New York this week for the 76th UN General Assembly’s high-level debate, many questions are being asked of an organization that has clearly become a sideshow, trying to pick up the pieces of an increasingly dysfunctional world. Short of major reforms to try and reclaim the reins of international diplomacy and multilateralism as the only vehicle to keep the peace in the world, the UN is in danger of withering into history. It is failing as a tool for nations to talk, rebuild confidence and find remedies, or at least manage the fallout caused by geopolitical divisions that have hindered the formation of a common approach to fighting a lethal pandemic and the imminent danger of climate change.
Though this week’s meeting is the first in-person gathering of leaders or their senior representatives since the pandemic began, I am yet to see any state calling for the UN to stay in session for longer as a means to reaffirm its member states’ seriousness in finding solutions to issues they can collectively tackle. If it was down to me, I would lock all the attendees in until they agreed to draw up a new mechanism that protects peace and prosperity all over the world.
The UN needs a more inclusive and functional mechanism that takes into consideration the changes that have hit the world politically, economically, socially and technologically. In 1945, the world tried to put the era of global wars behind it, so 51 countries devised a vision and mission for an organization that would work to protect peace and prosperity between nation states. Maybe there is now a need to go back to the drawing board to design an institution that not only deals with peace between nation states, but also between states and non-state actors, and between states and the tech giants. It also would not be an exaggeration to propose departments to deal with potential space and deep-sea conflicts.
I really don’t know how much pressure is building on world leaders or their agendas at the UNGA to ratchet up efforts to fight climate change or the pandemic as two examples connected to the survival of the whole planet, which ignore the pressing priorities of each individual nation and its domestic, regional and international challenges. In the Global North, the main priority of leaders is to mitigate re-election challenges. In the Global South, many so-called leaders oversee bankrupt countries or play a role in bankrupting them; hence, they are unable to save the planet or stop COVID-19’s spread.
In the Middle East, it is a mixture of the above that is curtailing efforts to fight global warming and the pandemic. In some Arab and Muslim states, neighbors or foreign powers are meddling in their affairs and distracting their efforts to provide people with 24/7 power, while in others the fight against imperialism hampers attempts to provide infrastructure that could supply clean water to the population, let alone guarantee basic freedoms or the rule of law.
If it was down to me, I would lock all the attendees in until they agreed to draw up a new mechanism that protects peace and prosperity all over the world.
Since the inception of the UN, alarm bells have sounded daily, weekly, monthly and annually to warn against the erosion of trust and the spread of conflict. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ warning of a new cold war between China and the US — and, I would say, between China and Russia on one side and the US and some of its allies on the other — is leading to “political fissures,” “confrontation” and contentiousness across the planet. –AN
