By Dr. Palitha Kohona
NEW YORK, Mar 26 2015 (IPS)

With Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s term of office tapering off by the end of 2016, there is increasing chatter in the corridors of the United Nations on his successor.

Amb. Palitha Kohona. Credit: U.N. Photo/Mark Garten

The interest in the top post at the U.N. has been heightened because of the issues that have emerged.

Among them: the importance of respecting the principle of regional rotation; the need to have a woman occupy the top job at the U.N. after 70 years of its existence; and the importance of more transparency in an organisation that devotes much energy to promote democracy in the world.

These are prominent among some of the conversation starters in the U.N. cocktail circuit, all against the background clamour to reform the Organisation.

The Charter itself says little on the appointment process. Article 97 stipulates that the General Assembly (GA) will appoint a secretary-general (SG) on the recommendation of the Security Council. As with much else at the U.N., the practice with regard to the appointment of the SG also has evolved in response to contemporary pressures. Resolutions 11/1 of 1946 and 54/246 of 1997 are important on this matter.

The Security Council will, in the first instance, seek consensus prior to recommending a candidate to the GA, although 9 votes in favour of a candidate in the Council would suffice.

If consensus is not feasible, the Council will vote on the candidates available. The practice of conducting straw polls among the members of the SC has become popular in recent times.While early aspirants to the post did not campaign under spurious pretexts, the need to approach a wide range of countries to seek their blessings is increasingly recognised.

To the disappointment of many members of the world body, the recommendation is adopted at a private meeting in accordance with Rule 48 of the Provisional Rules of Procedure.

The Permanent Five of the SC (P5) – namely Britain, the U.S. France Russia and China — exercises inordinate power over the selection process. Today the endorsement of the P5 is essential and consequently the veto acquires a particular significance in the SC recommendation.

In 1996, the significance of P5 endorsement was clearly highlighted. As the Council began its consideration of potential candidates, Boutros Boutros Ghali, the incumbent SG, received 14 endorsements in a straw poll, except the U.S.

Boutros Ghali had offended the U.S. with comments on the situation in the Middle East. A week later, a former senior U.N. official, Kofi Annan, a surprise candidate from the Secretariat, received the necessary endorsement of the SC with the backing of the P5.

Similarly, former Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim’s efforts to secure a third term in1981 were vetoed by the Chinese. It is now almost mandatory for the aspirants to the post of SG to undertake visits to the capitals of the P5 to seek their blessings and not say or do anything that would cause them alarm.

This was not always the case. When, in 1951,Trygve Lie of Norway was vetoed by the Soviet Union, as he sought his second term, the U.S. had him appointed through a clear majority of votes in the GA. Given the difficulties that Trygve Lie faced subsequently, especially in dealing with a hostile Soviet Union, it would be unlikely that such an approach would be adopted today.

Although there are suggestions that the SC should recommend more than one candidate, for the sake of transparency and to facilitate democratic choice, the GA has decided in Res 11 of 1946 that it would be desirable for the Council to proffer only one candidate.

Whether this sentiment continues to be shared by many in the GA today with its much wider membership is unclear. While a divisive vote in the GA is always possible, in recent times, the GA has tended to rubber stamp the recommendations of the SC.

While early aspirants to the post did not campaign under spurious pretexts, the need to approach a wide range of countries to seek their blessings is increasingly recognised. Visits to capitals could generate a groundswell of sympathy for a candidate which could influence members of the SC.

The present incumbent, a former Foreign Minister of South Korea, advancing his candidature the first time round, used his position as his country’s representative in the SC to visit as many capitals as possible.

The second time round, he was advised to seek the endorsement of the regional groups as he was mulling presenting his candidature, in particular, the Asia Pacific Group, his own regional group.

This was against the background of some whispered reservations about his performance in the first term, especially by certain countries of the Western Europe and Others Group (WEOG).

They were mostly concerns about his perceived lack of fluency in the working languages of the Organisation and the absence of firmness in dealing with difficult issues.

Still, the Asia Pacific Group endorsed him unequivocally, setting in motion a tide of endorsements from the other regional groups. He announced his candidature immediately following his meeting with the Asia Pacific Group.

The WEOGs provided the first two SGs. An assertive developing world demanded the next. U Thant of Burma (now Myanmar) was appointed, despite initial opposition from France.

The Eastern European Group has asserted a claim to the post after Ban because the group has never had this position before and because there are many suitable candidates from the region.

Res 51/241 supports their position. Among the possible Eastern European aspirants are the former U.N. Under-Secretary-General and the Former President of Slovenia, Danilo Turk, the Executive DIrector of UNESCO, Irena Bukova of Bulgaria, EC Commissioner, Kristalina Georgieva of Bulgaria, the Lithuanian President, Dalia Grybauskaite, the vice Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Monte Negro, Igor Luksic, and the popular Permanent Representative of Romania, Simona Miculescu.

The WEOGs have occupied the post three times – the Asia Pacific twice, Africa twice and Latin America and the Caribbean once. Candidates from the P5s are not considered for the post. Should Eastern Europe come up with a suitable candidate, they are likely to get the post this time.

Given the perceived lack of clarity with regard to the Eastern European candidature, others have begun to test the water.

Among them are, Kevin Rudd, the former Prime Minister of Australia; Helen Clerk, the Administrator of the UNDP and former Prime Minister of New Zealand; Antonio Guterres, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and former Prime Minister of Portugal; and Michelle Bachelet, former Executive Director of UN Women and current president of Chile.

It is noteworthy that the Non-Aligned Movement, the largest single political grouping of developing nations, has strongly backed the appointment of a woman to succeed Ban.

The general feeling among Member States is that the time for a woman SG has arrived. There does not seem to be a shortage of exceptionally qualified women in the field.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Excerpt:

The aftermath of a bombing in Aleppo, Syria, Feb. 6, 2014. Credit: Freedom House/cc by 2.0

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 17 2015 (IPS)

As the long drawn-out Syrian military conflict passed a four-year milestone over the weekend, the New York-based Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) summed it up in a striking headline: 4 years, 4 vetoes, 220,000 dead.

It was a harsh judgment of the 15-member Security Council, the most powerful political body at the United Nations, which critics say is desperately in need of a resurrection."Those states who have vetoed resolutions aimed at ending atrocities in Syria will be judged very harshly by history." -- Dr. Simon Adams

The devastating civil war and the sectarian violence in Syria have also displaced over 11 million people – more than half of Syria’s population – with 12 million in need of humanitarian assistance.

Dr. Simon Adams, executive director of the Global Centre for R2P, told IPS Syria is clearly the most tragic failure of the U.N. Security Council in a generation.

“Each veto and the inaction of the Council has been interpreted as a license to kill by atrocity perpetrators in Syria,” he added.

The four vetoes, cast by Russia and China to protect the beleaguered government of Syrian President Bashar al Assad, were cast in October 2011, February 2012, July 2012 and May 2014.

Dr. Adams said 220,000 dead is a horrifying indictment of the magnitude of the Security Council’s failure in Syria. “They constitute 220,000 reasons why we need reform of the veto rights of the five permanent members when it comes to mass atrocity crimes.”

The five (P-5) holding veto powers are the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia – and each of them has exercised the veto mostly to protect their close allies or their national interests over the years.

Since the creation of the United Nations 70 years ago, the two big powers have cast the most number of vetoes: a total of 79 by the United States and 11 by the Russian Federation (plus 90 by its predecessor, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics or USSR), while China’s tally is nine, according to the latest available figures.

“The veto costs lives. Those states who have vetoed resolutions aimed at ending atrocities in Syria will be judged very harshly by history. They have a responsibility to protect and a responsibility not to veto,” Dr. Adams said.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who has consistently called for a political solution, said the Syrian people feel increasingly abandoned by the world as they enter the fifth year of the war that has torn their country apart.

They and their neighbours, he said, continue to suffer under the eyes of an international community that is divided and incapable of taking collective action to stop the killing and destruction.

Retracing the violent history of the ongoing conflict, Ban recalled that it began in March 2011, when thousands of Syrian civilians went to the streets peacefully calling for political reform.

But this legitimate demand was met with a violent response from the Syrian authorities. Over time, civilians took up arms in response, regional powers became involved and radical groups gained a foothold, he added.

In what appeared to be a diplomatic turnaround, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has not ruled out a political solution to the Syrian civil war.

“We are working very hard with other interested parties to see if we can reignite a diplomatic outcome,” he said during a television interview Sunday, although the U.S. has been supporting rebel forces trying to overthrow the Assad regime by military means.

Angelina Jolie Pitt, a Hollywood celebrity and Special Envoy for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said: “People are entitled to feel bewildered and angry that the U.N. Security Council seems unable to respond to the worst crisis of the 21st century.”

She said it is shameful that even the basic demand for full humanitarian access has not been met.

Meanwhile, neighbouring countries and international humanitarian agencies are being stretched beyond their limits.

“And it is sickening that crimes are being committed against the Syrian people on a daily basis with impunity. The failure to end this crisis diminishes all of us,” Jolie declared.

Ban said the lack of accountability in Syria has led to an exponential rise in war crimes, crimes against humanity and other human rights violations.

Each day, he said, brings reports of fresh horrors: executions, widespread arbitrary arrests, abductions and disappearances as well as systematic torture in detention; indiscriminate bombardment of civilian areas, including with barrel bombs; siege and starvation tactics; use of chemical weapons, and atrocities committed by Daesh (the Islamic State) and other extremist groups.

Dr. Adams told IPS President Assad and all atrocity perpetrators in Syria belong in handcuffs at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.

“The U.N. Security Council has failed to end a conflict that has already cost 220,000 lives, but the least they can do now is refer the situation to the ICC so that victims have some chance of justice,” he said.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@aol.com

Nassir Abdulaziz Al-Nasser. Credit: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe

By Roger Hamilton-Martin
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 10 2014 (IPS)

Ambassador Nassir Abdulaziz al-Nasser currently heads the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations. Between 2011-2012 he was president of the General Assembly, setting the agenda for debate in the assembly during the Arab Spring.

His new book, “A year at the helm of the General Assembly” has just been published by NYU Press.You don’t want to enlarge the Security Council for the sake of representation only. No, (you must enlarge) for the commitment, the contribution.

IPS correspondent Roger Hamilton-Martin interviewed the ambassador on issues central to the book– mediation and U.N. reform. Excerpts from the interview follow.

Q: How can we reform the General Assembly to ensure that practical steps are taken to improve implementation of resolutions by member states?

A: I look at the problem from (the perspective of) the mandate of the president of the General Assembly. One year. How can you achieve good results in one year? I was lucky because I was elected in February 2011 and I was still the ambassador of Qatar to the U.N., so it gave me enough time to prepare and organise.

I was ready from June, you know. June 2011. I took over in September. For someone who doesn’t know the system very well, he doesn’t know many people in the U.N… by the time he takes over, half of the year is gone. By the time he wants to discuss and reach agreement or create consensus, the other half is gone.

We need at least two years for the president. At least, if not more. One of the former PGAs tried to, with many countries, to try to come up with an agreement and a draft resolution to amend the charter. They faced great difficulties.

Q: On the Security Council, some say that certain countries are less relevant to global security currently than they were – Britain and France, for example. Should these countries stay as permanent members?

A: It is not up to me to say, “This country is better than that country.” This is a negotiation that must be had amongst the P5. We are looking at this to increase the permanent members not to decrease the current (P5) – they will be there.

We need more, you see many emerging powers around the world and they can also contribute to peace and security. You don’t need them for prestige; you need them for their involvement, for their support, for their role in the regions.

That’s where I am talking about how to reform, not to change the structure. We need a very effective council. How to achieve that? You have to look at what was the problem in the last 60, 70 years and how you can change based on that. I served there, I represented Qatar. If you don’t have consensus, and solidarity on issues, it’s a big problem.

The agreement among the 15 is very important. First among the P5, and then among the 15. So you don’t want to enlarge the council for the sake of representation only. No, (you must enlarge) for the commitment, the contribution.

Q: Is there a reluctance to amend the charter?

A: The P5 will not allow it. The United Nations always been accused by many people, NGOs, governments, but they don’t know, it’s not the fault of the U.N.

The U.N. is a state-driven – if there is consensus, there is agreement, and there is achievement. If there is no achievement, there is nothing. I want here to add a commend to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon – he in his two terms did a lot, but still needs the support of member states.

If there is support you will see a different U.N.  I’m sure in the constitutions of many countries from time to time there is an amendment to deal with issues that weren’t there 100 or 200 years ago. It’s very essential and very important.

Q: In the history of the U.N. General Assembly (UNGA), there have only been three female presidents. What could be done to heighten participation?

A: We would love to see UNGA female presidents. Women who have assumed senior positions at the U.N. in general as under secretary-generals or assistant secretary generals have done remarkable jobs. I am sure they will do great as presidents of the General Assembly as well.

We need to encourage member states who nominate their candidates for this top position to support women candidates.  I am all for women leadership and gender balance.

Q: With the current situation in Iraq and Syria, what role does mediation have to play when it comes to ISIS? Is there a place for sitting down at the table with a militant organisation?

A: Today we always accuse governments that they are not doing enough. But politics and political decisions are not enough.  There is a responsibility on the religious leaders, there is responsibility on civil society, there is a responsibility on academia and university, there is responsibility even on the private sector.

So I think we should work together – religious leaders today can get involved in what’s going on with ISIS. You know young people – lack of education, negative environment, they an easy target for those people (ISIS).

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The United States cannot legally intervene militarily in Syria without the backing of the United Nations Security Council. Credit: Bomoon Lee/IPS

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 28 2013 (IPS)

When the administration of President George W. Bush launched a military attack on Iraq in March 2003, it was nearly 18 months before Kofi Annan, then-U.N. secretary-general, described the invasion as “illegal” and in “violation of the U.N. charter” because the United States did not have Security Council authorisation.

But Annan paid a heavy political price for his words, recounts James A. Paul, who has closely monitored the United Nations for nearly 19 years as executive director of the New York-based Global Policy Forum. The Bush administration was so furious that Annan soon came under attack and virtually his entire senior team were driven out of their posts by U.S. pressure, he said.

Asked if current Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon would follow in Annan’s footsteps should the U.S. military attack Syria without the blessings of the Security Council, Paul told IPS that “however much international law is disregarded, we can expect Ban Ki-moon to act cautiously and say nothing of substance.”

“This is his own proclivity anyway, but he will also be looking over his shoulder and noting what happened to his predecessor,” Paul added.

As the administration of President Barack Obama has started beating the war drums, there is speculation that the United States may bypass the Security Council – primarily because any resolution invoking Chapter 7 of the U.N. charter, endorsing military action, is expected to be vetoed by Russia and possibly China.

A draft resolution on Syria, initiated by the United Kingdom, is currently circulating but may be shot down before it reaches a formal council meeting or is vetoed at a meeting.

A strong supporter of the beleaguered Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Russia has already exercised its veto three times, along with China, preventing sanctions against Damascus.

The United Nations also appears to be heading towards a political confrontation with the United States, which has already declared that Syria had used chemical weapons, upstaging a team of U.N. inspectors inside Syria still trying to establish the facts.

At a press conference in the Peace Palace in the Hague, the secretary-general said the use of chemical weapons by anyone, for any reasons, under any circumstances, would be an atrocious violation of international law."International law says that military action must be taken after a decision by the Security Council."
-- Lakhdar Brahimi

But it is essential to establish the facts, he said, taking a dig at the United States. “A United Nations investigation team is now on the ground to do just that,” he added.

Just days after the attacks, the team has collected valuable samples and interviewed victims and witnesses, but it needs time to do its job, Ban said. His request for more time comes amid reports from Washington that the United States has already asked Ban to withdraw his inspection team.

Paul told IPS the chemical weapons attack in Syria and the debates in the Security Council recall previous episodes when Washington sought backing for war. “Who can forget the presentation by [then-U.S. Secretary of State] Colin Powell to the council on Feb. 5, 2003, a presentation riddled with falsehoods, he later said he felt regret about?”

The leader of the U.N. inspection team in Iraq at that time, Hans Blix, has commented tellingly on the rush to war in Syria.

Recalling how the U.S. and the UK preempted the U.N. inspection process, he has warned that this time “we cannot rely on the self-interested pronouncements of powerful states and the facts must be considered dispassionately.” The United States is not the world’s policeman, Blix added.

At his press conference in the Hague, Ban implicitly called for Security Council, not unilateral, action against Syria, saying, “Let us adhere to the United Nations Charter.”

He said it was necessary to pursue all avenues to bring parties to the negotiating table and that the joint envoy of the United Nations and the Arab League, Lakhdar Brahimi, continues his efforts. Above all, he added, the Security Council must uphold its moral and political responsibilities under the U.N. Charter.

But at a press conference in Geneva, Brahimi was more forthright in stressing the primacy of the Security Council. “International law says that military action must be taken after a decision by the Security Council,” he said. “What will happen, then again, I don’t know.”

He tempered his comments by pointing out that “President Obama and the American administration are not known to be trigger-happy.”

Citing legal precedence, Paul told IPS the Syria situation under international law is clear: The U.N. Charter allows only two cases of military action against another state: in self-defence against an imminent attack and in response to a Security Council resolution.

Neither will apply in this case, because a resolution, if brought, would be vetoed, Paul predicted.

So Washington is reaching for other justifications and looking at past interventions for recycled rationales. One is the concept of moral policy and the related “just war” idea, promoted by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair in his famous speech in Chicago in defence of the Kosovo NATO bombings in 1999.

This dangerous approach enables powerful countries to attack others on the basis of supposedly ethical judgments, “judgments which we know are always rooted in their self-interest”, said Paul.

Another approach is the less appealing idea that military action is illegal but legitimate, proposed after Kosovo by a panel of jurists but widely regarded as dangerously vague and subjective.

Yet another rationale, currently more faddish, is the idea of “responsibility to protect” (R2P). It is the idea that if states fail to protect their citizens, the international community should act. But here, too, the ground is very shaky, Paul noted.

R2P, as spelled out in 2005, is vague and does not justify action outside U.N. authorisation. So Washington is in a pickle, worsened by the refusal of the Arab League to give regional justification for military action, he said.

Any talk about Security Council paralysis sidesteps the issue of the veto that, used as a threat, blocks council action on a nearly daily basis and is used prolifically by Washington and all other permanent members.

“More bombing will not solve Syria’s problems nor set in motion a new and more responsible government,” Paul declared. “It will only prolong the killing.”

Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson speaks to journalists on Aug. 21 following his closed-door briefing to the Security Council on the latest allegations of chemical weapons use in Syria. Credit: UN Photo/Rick Bajornas

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 22 2013 (IPS)

The United States, Britain and France, three veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council, are making a strong push for an “urgent” U.N. investigation of the alleged use of chemical weapons Wednesday in Syria.

The UK Deputy Permanent Representative Ambassador Phillip Parham told reporters Thursday that a letter, signed by over 35 member states, was being delivered to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for a “swift investigation”.

But he refused to identify the countries, nor was letter made public.

The letter, a copy of which was obtained by IPS, did not contain the list of signatories. The only three permanent members taking the lead, and whose signatures appear on the letter, were the United States, Britain and France.

Both Russia and China, the other two permanent members, were not signatories.

The letter, dated Aug. 21, says: “We would like to bring to your attention credible reports of the use of chemical weapons on 21 August 2013 in Rif Damascus. Given the gravity of these reports, we judge it essential that all the pertinent facts are swiftly investigated.”

The letter requests the secretary-general to launch an urgent investigation into these allegations “as expeditiously as possible” under the auspices of the secretary general’s ‘Mechanism for the Investigation of Alleged Use of Chemical and Biological Weapons.’

This “mechanism” was derived from the mandate established by the U.N. General Assembly in its resolution A/RES/42/37C of Nov. 30, 1987.

The letter requests Ban to “report back to Member States as soon as possible”.

Russia, which has stood by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, claims the alleged chemical arms attack Wednesday was a “pre-planned provocation” orchestrated by the rebels.

A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman was quoted as saying, “All of this looks like an attempt at all costs to create a pretext for demanding that the U.N. Security Council side with opponents of the regime and undermine the chances of convening the Geneva conference.”

The proposed conference was aimed at peace negotiations between the Syrian government and rebels, but it has failed to get off the ground.

Currently, there is a U.N. team in Damascus trying to investigate earlier attacks with chemical weapons, but the team’s mandate is limited to whether or not chemical weapons were used in these attacks last year. And the team does not have a mandate to pin the blame either on the Syrian government or the rebels.

“We are aware that the UN Mission is now in Damascus,” the letter notes. “We urge you to do all you can to ensure that the Mission has urgent access to all relevant sites and sources of information.”

To assist the investigation, the letter lists a selection of open source information, along with web links.

Meanwhile, in a statement released Thursday, the secretary-general said he was shocked to hear the reports of the alleged use of chemical weapons in the suburbs of Damascus.

Professor Ake Sellstrom, a Swedish expert on chemical weapons, and his team are currently in Syria to investigate the alleged use of chemical weapons reported by the government of Syria at Khan al-Assal, as well as two other allegations of the use of chemical weapons reported by member states, he noted.

According to the agreement reached in Damascus in July, the two parties are discussing, in parallel, other allegations and their related sites.

The United Nations mission to investigate allegations of chemical weapons use in Syria is following the current situation in Syria carefully, and remains fully engaged in the investigation process that is mandated by the secretary-general, said a statement from his spokesman.

“Professor Sellstrom is in discussions with the Syrian government on all issues pertaining to the alleged use of chemical weapons, including this most recent reported incident. The Secretary-General reiterates that any use of chemical weapons by any side under any circumstances would violate international humanitarian law,” the statement added.

Meanwhile, the 15-members of the Security Council issued a statement Thursday calling for a U.N. investigation of the chemical weapons attack. But it stopped short of adopting a resolution, which would have been vetoed by Russia and possibly China.

Philippe Bolopion, U.N. Director at Human Rights Watch, said the “tortuous Security Council unofficial statement” on Syria misses the mark and fails the victims.

“When faced with serious allegations of chemical weapons use in Syria, rather than seeking the truth and demanding cooperation with U.N. investigators, Russia and China chose once again to protect a government that has been slaughtering its own population,” he said.

“They will go down in history as two major enablers of Assad’s bloody tactics to repress the Syrian people.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin faces a growing confrontation with Washington. Credit: Imaginary Museum Projects: News Tableaus/cc by 2.0

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 7 2013 (IPS)

The growing political rift between the United States and Russia triggered by the granting of temporary asylum to U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden, who is now holed up in Moscow, is threatening to further undermine relations between the two superpowers at the United Nations.

With the U.S. decision Wednesday to call off an upcoming summit meeting between U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin, which was scheduled to take place in Moscow early September, the negative fall-out is expected to have an impact on several politically sensitive issues, including the civil war in Syria, Iran’s nuclear programme and the proposed reduction in nuclear arms."Even as the U.S. and Russia engage in a public spat over Snowden, their overriding bilateral interests will be in maintaining some kind of arms reduction relationship." -- Dr. Rebecca Johnson of the Acronym Institute

Russia, along with China, has already vetoed four Western and U.S. inspired Security Council resolutions aimed at punishing Syria – and the chances of any future U.N. sanctions on Damascus remain remote.

“The strained political relations between the U.S. and Russia will further reduce the Security Council to a non-entity,” warns an Asian diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity.

At the same time, he pointed out, the on-again, off-again Geneva conference on Syria looks to be another casualty.

The growing confrontation between the two superpowers also comes amidst the first-ever high level meeting of the General Assembly on nuclear disarmament scheduled to take place Sep. 26.

In a speech at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin last June, Obama called for drastic cuts in nuclear weapons, which was expected to be on the agenda of a proposed nuclear summit in 2016.

Tilman A Ruff, co-chair, International Steering Group and Australian board member of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, told IPS the disagreement between Russia and the U.S. over Snowden could be used by the US as a pretext to fail to make progress on disarmament.

“That is why the 184 U.N. member states that don’t have nuclear weapons should stop being held hostage by the nine nuclear armed states,” he said.

They should take the lead and begin negotiating a treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons, paving the way for their eradication, said Ruff, who is also an associate professor at the Nossal Institute for Global Health at the University of Melbourne.

Besides the five permanent members (P5) of the Security Council, namely the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia, the other four undeclared nuclear weapons states include India, Pakistan, Israel, and possibly North Korea.

Dr. Rebecca Johnson, executive director of the Acronym Institute for Disarmament and Diplomacy, told IPS the United States and Russia have far too many mutual interests at stake for Russia’s granting of temporary asylum to Edward Snowden to derail them.

“This won’t be a return to the Cold War,” she said, sounding less pessimistic.

She pointed out that Putin imprisoned Russian nuclear analyst Igor Sutyagin for over 11 years, and is as keen as the United States to prevent exposure of security and intelligence practices and mistakes.

“So even as the U.S. and Russia engage in a public spat over Snowden, their overriding bilateral interests will be in maintaining some kind of arms reduction relationship,” she said.

As more and more governments raise concerns about the humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons, said Dr Johnson, Russia and the U.S. will probably want to put on a strong show of P5 solidarity at the High Level Meeting at the U.N., in the hope of heading off the growing calls to ban nuclear weapons globally.

Ruff told IPS that nuclear weapons pose a mortal danger like no other to everyone, wherever they live.

With 16,200 (94 percent) of the world’s 17,270 nuclear weapons between them, Russia and the U.S. bear a heavy responsibility to remove this existential threat.

“Yet both are developing new nuclear weapons and spending between them more than 75 billion dollars per year to modernise their nuclear arsenals, with every indication that they plan to retain them indefinitely,” Ruff noted.

Eradicating nuclear weapons is the most urgent global priority, and must not be derailed because of other issues, said Ruff, who is also the international medical advisor for the Australian Red Cross.

When the 193-member U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) holds is first-ever high-level meeting on nuclear disarmament next September, there is little or no hope that any of the nuclear powers will make a firm commitment to gradually phase out or abandon their lethal arsenals.

At the beginning of 2013, eight states – UK, the United States, Russia, France, China, India, Pakistan and Israel – possessed approximately 4,400 operational nuclear weapons, according to the latest Yearbook released Monday by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI)."Our job is to help push the issue of the abolition of nuclear weapons up the political ladder so that they will cooperate on disarmament." -- Jonathan Granoff of the Global Security Institute

Nearly 2,000 of these are kept in a state of high operational alert, SIPRI said.

Jonathan Granoff, president of the Global Security Institute and adjunct professor of International Law at the Widener University School of Law, told IPS, “What is needed to counteract the slow pace in arms control and disarmament is higher political profile.”

For example, he said, if certain leaders were to say at the General Assembly, “My country is one of 114 countries in a nuclear weapons-free zone. We want to help countries relying on nuclear weapons for security to obtain the benefits of helping to make the entire world a nuclear weapons-free zone.”

The SIPRI report highlights the need to bring commitments made solemnly at the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference in 2012 to advance nuclear disarmament into action.

Promises must mean something, said Granoff.

If all nuclear warheads are counted, says SIPRI, these eight states together possess a total of approximately 17,265 nuclear weapons, as compared with 19,000 at the beginning of 2012.

The decrease is due mainly to Russia and the United States further reducing their inventories of strategic nuclear weapons under the terms of the Treaty on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (New START), as well as retiring ageing and obsolescent weapons.

At the same time, says SIPRI, all five legally recognised nuclear weapons states – China, France, Russia, Britain and the United States – are either deploying new nuclear weapon delivery systems or have announced programmes to do so, and appear determined to retain their nuclear arsenals indefinitely.

Of the five, only China seems to be expanding its nuclear arsenal.

And of the others, India and Pakistan are both expanding their nuclear weapon stockpiles and missile delivery capabilities.

“Once again there was little to inspire hope that the nuclear weapon-possessing states are genuinely willing to give up their nuclear arsenals,” according to SIPRI.

“The long-term modernisation programmes under way in these states suggest that nuclear weapons are still a marker of international status and power,” says Shannon Kile, senior researcher at SIPRI’s Project on Nuclear Arms Control, Disarmament and Non-proliferation.

Asked if the upcoming UNGA disarmament conference will produce anything tangible towards the elimination of nuclear weapons, Kile told IPS that in light of current trends in global nuclear arsenals, the General Assembly cannot be reasonably expected to be able to adopt concrete measures that will require the nuclear weapon-possessing states to begin eliminating these weapons or to change their nuclear force postures and operational practices.

However, the positive role the UNGA can play in terms of strengthening existing norms and political commitments to pursue nuclear disarmament should not be underestimated, Kile said.

This involves, first and foremost, maintaining political pressure on the nuclear weapon-possessing states to reduce the role and salience of nuclear weapons in their national security strategies and defence postures.

This could be done, for example, by persuading these states to adopt explicit declaratory policies ruling out the first-use of nuclear weapons, and to provide legally-binding negative security assurances – that is, guarantees not to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states.

In the longer term, he said, the UNGA can contribute to and strengthen efforts to devalue nuclear weapons as a currency of international geopolitics and to delegitimise their possession.

“This will admittedly be a part of a long-term process that will require considerable patience and diplomatic persistence but its normative significance should not be overlooked,” Kile added.

Granoff told IPS the deals the administration of President Barack Obama believed it had to make to get the START Treaty ratified in the U.S. Senate included modernisation of aspects of the nuclear arsenal. Some modernisation simply keeps the weapons in a stable situation while others actually improve accuracy and reliability and could be construed as a form of vertical proliferation, he said.

“Such activities should not be funded, but even if they are, they are not being brought into practice because of military geo strategic planning,” Granoff said.

However, he said, it is not the case that such actions affirm the status of nuclear weapons or a commitment to abrogate pledges under the NPT to move toward a nuclear weapons-free world.

“They only represent short term political deals necessary in an extremely difficult domestic partisan environment to achieve modest arms control measures,” Kile said.

But to say that the policy is not to move in the correct direction is incorrect, he added.

Granoff said there is a new open-ended working group in Geneva that will come up with recommendations.

Norway recently hosted a large conference with many countries highlighting the horrific humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons. These activities bode well for our future, he said.

“It is odd that the P5 (UK, United States, Russia, France and China) did not participate in these activities,” Granoff added. “It shows, however, that they can cooperate and come up with the same strategy and positions when they want.

“Our job is to help push the issue of the abolition of nuclear weapons up the political ladder so that they will cooperate on disarmament,” he said.

Asked about the absence of North Korea from the list of nuclear weapon states, Kile told IPS, “The section of the Yearbook’s nuclear forces chapter dealing with North Korea’s nuclear weapon capabilities notes that it is not known whether North Korea has produced operational (militarily usable) nuclear weapons.”

An operational weapon is not the same as a simple nuclear explosive device and would require more advanced design and engineering skills to build, he said.

“We have published in SIPRI Yearbook 2013 the estimate of six to eight nuclear weapons to indicate the maximum number that North Korea may possess, based on publicly-available information about its plutonium production activities.

“But again, it is unclear whether North Korea has actually produced operational nuclear weapons, so we did not include it in the table in the press release,” he added.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is one of the most vociferous advocates of a world free of nuclear weapons.

The lack of publicity stands in contrast to the strong public stand taken by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who has consistently called for the total elimination of nuclear weapons. Credit: Bomoon Lee/IPS

“Nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation are not utopian ideals,” he says. “They are critical to global peace and security.”

Still, the Group of 77, the largest single coalition of 132 developing countries, implicitly accuses the United Nations of falling short in its efforts to publicise a meeting on nuclear disarmament scheduled to take place Sep. 26.

Ambassador Peter Thomson of Fiji, the G77 chair, last week described the upcoming talks as “the first-ever high level meeting of the General Assembly on nuclear disarmament.”

He said the meeting is of importance to developing nations, and therefore, all efforts should be made to give it timely and wide publicity.

A G77 delegate told IPS the conference is not getting the advance publicity it should, probably because three of the big powers, the United States, UK and France, are not supportive of the meeting.

“We have not seen anything on the high level meeting so far,” he added.

The lack of coverage stands in contrast to the strong public stand taken by the secretary-general, who has consistently called for the total elimination of nuclear weapons.

Asked about the significance of the upcoming meeting, Dr. John Burroughs, executive director of the New York-based Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy, told IPS the meeting is a chance for world leaders, including U.S. President Barack Obama and others, to give direction to the nuclear disarmament enterprise, “which is now drifting aimlessly despite much rhetoric over the past five years.”

“Of course they should reassert that the global elimination of nuclear weapons is a shared aim of the international community,” he said.

But they can and should do more, he said, specifically to set in motion concrete, multilateral processes to achieve that objective.

“If there can be a Nuclear Security Summit process, focused on securing nuclear materials, why can there not be a Nuclear Disarmament Summit Process?” he asked.

Or definitive action could be taken to overcome the 16-year deadlock in the Conference on Disarmament, if necessary by establishing a separate process, Dr Burroughs said.

The resolution calling for the high-level meeting, which was sponsored by Indonesia and the 120-member Non-Aligned Movement, was adopted last December in the General Assembly by a vote of 179 to none against, with four abstentions (Israel, and three of the five permanent members of the Security Council, namely France, UK and the United States).

The other two permanent members, China and Russia, voted for the resolution.

All five permanent members are the world’s five declared nuclear powers, with India, Pakistan, Israel, and more recently North Korea, outside the P-5 nuclear club.

In an explanation of his country’s decision to abstain on the vote, Guy Pollard, deputy permanent representative of the UK, told delegates last December, “We question the value of holding a high-level meeting (HLM) of the General Assembly on nuclear disarmament when there are already sufficient venues for such discussion.”

He cited the General Assembly’s First Committee (on Disarmament), the U.N. Disarmament Commission, and the Conference on Disarmament.

“We are puzzled about how such a HLM will further the goals of the NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty) Action Plan that was agreed by consensus in 2010,” Pollard said.

“In our view,” he said, “this roadmap of actions offers the best way of taking forward the multilateral nuclear disarmament agenda, along with related issues.”

“We continue to believe that nuclear non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament are mutually reinforcing and therefore regret that this high level meeting doesn’t treat both of these aspects in a balanced manner,” Pollard said.

Meanwhile, in a new study released last month, George Perkovich, director of the Nuclear Policy Programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, points out one of the few ways that President Obama could restore confidence in U.S. intentions would be to update the declaration of the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. security policy, including in defence of its allies.

“In his searching Nobel Peace Prize speech (in December 2009), Obama recognised the occasional inescapability of war and the imperative of waging it justly,” Perkovich said.

So, too, Obama now could examine how the ongoing existence of nuclear arsenals, even if temporary, can be reconciled with the moral-strategic imperative to prevent their use, says the study titled “Do Unto Others: Toward a Defensible Nuclear Doctrine.”

“The president could articulate a limited framework for the legitimate use of nuclear weapons that the United States believes would be defensible for others to follow as long as nuclear weapons remain,” it says.

Such a nuclear policy, says Perkovich, could then be conveyed in the U.S. Defence Department’s Quadrennial Posture Review, which is due later this year.

Dr. Burroughs told IPS that non-nuclear weapon states have been doing their best to create opportunities to set a clear course on disarmament.

At the initiative of Austria, Mexico and Norway, the General Assembly in 2012 established an open-ended working group on taking forward proposals on multilateral nuclear disarmament negotiations, scheduled to meet for three weeks this summer in Geneva.

Norway hosted a conference in Oslo in March on the humanitarian impact of nuclear explosions.

And Indonesia and the Non-Aligned Movement proposed the resolution last year that scheduled the September high-level meeting on nuclear disarmament.

“However, the P-5 in the Security Council have been recalcitrant. So far they have said they will not participate in the open-ended working group,” said Dr. Burroughs.

They also declined the invitation to participate in the Oslo meeting. And last year the UK, the United States, and France, along with Israel, abstained on the resolution scheduling the high-level meeting, expressing doubt as to its value, he added.

“So the personal engagement of heads of state/government and foreign ministers is clearly necessary,” Burroughs said.

At lower levels, the Permanent Five officials have been floundering, he added.

“Unless there is a change of tune coming from the very top, the September meeting will turn out to be a fruitless exercise,” he said.

The crisis on the Korean peninsula should be a wake-up call.

The nuclear threats exchanged by North Korea and the United States have once again laid bare an often underappreciated fact, the unacceptable risks arising from reliance on nuclear weapons.

In September, P-5 leaders and other governments possessing nuclear arsenals should seize the moment to signal clearly, to their own governments as well as to the world, that they will now engage constructively with non-nuclear weapon states on a process for the global elimination of nuclear weapons, he said.

Parliamentarians, mayors, and civil society groups working for a nuclear weapons-free world should also take advantage of this global platform, which surprisingly is the first time a General Assembly high-level meeting will be held on nuclear disarmament, Dr Burroughs said.

After 20 long years of negotiations on a proposed expansion of the Security Council, African countries continue to be left out in the cold – even as African leaders complain that the international community has failed to respond to their demands for two permanent seats in the most powerful body at the United Nations.

Joyce Banda, the president of Malawi, said Africa makes up the single largest region within the United Nations, and a very significant proportion of issues discussed in the Security Council concern the African continent. Credit: UN Photo/J Carrier

When heads of state took the podium at the General Assembly sessions last month, an overwhelming majority of the more than 40 African political leaders criticised the marginalisation of their continent.

Speaker after speaker complained about the continued absence of Africa among countries which hold the five permanent seats (P5) in the Security Council – the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia.

Africa’s longstanding demand for at least two permanent seats with veto powers, and five non-permanent seats, as agreed by African heads of state back in March 2005, is still far from reality.

But there is a reason for this, says Dr. Kwame Akonor, associate professor of political science at Seton Hall University in New York, who has written extensively on the politics and economics of the continent.

“That the membership and power relations of the U.N. Security Council (UNSC) are anachronistic and inequitable, given the geopolitical realities of the 21st century, is irrefutable,” he told IPS.

But any significant reform aimed at changing the membership or procedures of the UNSC will meet fierce resistance from the five veto-wielding permanent members, who are unlikely to relinquish their rights easily, said Akonor, who is also director of the Centre for African Studies and the African Development Institute, a New York-based think tank.

Addressing the General Assembly sessions last month, Joyce Banda, the president of Malawi, said Africa makes up the single largest region within the United Nations, and a very significant proportion of issues discussed in the Security Council concern the African continent.

But still, she said, Africa’s longstanding demand is in limbo.

Robert Mugabe, the longtime president of Zimbabwe, was one of the most vociferous in demanding representation in the Security Council.

“For how long will the international community continue to ignore the aspirations of a whole continent of 54 countries?” he asked.

“Is this good governance? Is this democracy? And is this justice?” he asked. “We shall not be bought off with empty promises, nor shall we accept some cosmetic tinkering of the Security Council disguised as reform.”

The president of Gambia, Yahya Jammeh said, “Our collective security will continue to be undermined by geopolitical considerations unless and until we find the courage to reform the Security Council.”

The demand for permanent representation in the UNSC also came from several other leaders and officials from Africa, including Equatorial Guinea, Central African Republic and Tanzania.

At a meeting of African leaders in Ethiopia in March 2005, the African Union (AU), which represents virtually all of the states in the continent, adopted a resolution calling for two permanent and five non-permanent seats.

But the AU did not identify the two countries for the permanent seats because that question has remained divisive, with at least three countries making claims: South Africa, Nigeria and Egypt, among others.

The resolution laid down the following conditions: Even though Africa is opposed in principle to the veto, it is of the view that so long as it exists, and as a matter of common justice, it should be made available to all permanent members of the Security Council.

Secondly, the African Union should be responsible for the selection of Africa’s representatives in the Security Council, and most importantly, the question of the criteria for the selection of African members of the Security Council should be a matter for the AU to determine, taking into consideration the representative nature and capacity of those chosen.

Akonor told IPS that for Africa, the question of representation is more fraught because it cannot seem to agree on which country (or countries) to represent it at the Security Council.

“The paralysis, amongst African leaders, when it comes to how it will be represented has contributed to the continent’s marginalisation on discussions on any plausible reform measures,” he said.

One solution, he argued, is for African states to take the concept of Pax Africana seriously and rely on themselves when it comes to the establishment, enforcement and consolidation of their own peace and security.

As current negotiations stand, there are four countries (G4) who are frontrunners for permanent seats (without vetoes): India, Brazil, Germany and Japan.

A longtime political observer who has been monitoring the negotiations told IPS the simple answer is that the G4 never gave the African countries a firm commitment for two African seats (with veto powers).

Subsequently, the G4 gave up their bid for veto powers, agreeing to a new category of “permanent seats WITHOUT veto power”. But this is not acceptable to the African Group.

Had the Africans ever come on the side of G4, they would have had the required two-thirds majority in the General Assembly to push forward their claim for permanent seats, he added.

Rev. Gabriel Odima, president of the Africa Center for Peace and Democracy, told IPS there is no doubt the West has marginalised the African continent. But he also blamed African leaders for the status quo.

Impoverishment and conflict are the basic tools and economic forces which have engulfed the continent of Africa for years, he pointed out.

“The rampant corruption in countries like Uganda, Nigeria and Kenya provides an opportunity for the major players at the Security Council to block Africa from occupying the two permanent seats at the Security Council,” he said.

The absence of democracy, human rights abuses and poor governance continue to undermine Africa’s effort to play a role on the world stage, said Rev Odima.

“How could (permanent UNSC seats) be possible when the continent has failed to prevent the massacre in the Democratic Republic of Congo, human rights violations in Uganda and the looming crisis in Kenya? How could this be possible when African leaders have failed to manage their own affairs at home?” he asked.

The international community should help Africa move from the stigma of colonial legacy to a viable society where hunger is no longer a threat to human existence, where ballots replace guns, and where dictators will be brought to justice and held accountable for their atrocities against their people, he added.