2023-11-26 01:09:20
The UN is useless. It is a phrase that many utter whenever a conflict breaks out and that this global government simply appears “deeply concerned.” The United Nations Organization does not work and it is also very expensive, its detractors categorically state. However, it is often a criticism born of ignorance and that is directed exclusively at one of the six organs of the institution: the controversial Security Council.
It is responsible for “maintaining peace and security”, and no one denies that it is poorly designed to meet current challenges. Its resolutions are, theoretically, mandatory for the 193 countries represented at the UN. But an agreement is rarely reached within it that puts an end to war conflicts such as those that have arisen from the Russian invasion of Ukraine or the Hamas attacks against Israel. “It fails because of the fracture that exists in global governance, because of the growing division into blocs of the world,” explains Cristina Gallach, who became deputy secretary general under Ban Ki-moon.
It is easy to understand why the Security Council is inoperative. It has fifteen members, of which ten are rotating and five have a permanent position with the right of veto: the United States, China, Russia, the United Kingdom and France. This last group, motivated by antagonistic interests and ideologies, is the main culprit of the organization’s bad reputation. Because it doesn’t matter if a resolution has 14 votes in favor. It is enough for one of the permanent members to oppose it so that it does not go ahead.
An increasingly divided world
«There is a new division between the global north and the global south, which is led by countries like China, Russia or Iran. The world is more complex than when the UN was created and is much more intertwined than then,” explains Gallach, in reference to the new relationships of interdependence that globalization has woven. This explains why, even in matters that do not directly affect them, the great powers put a spanner in the works. Not in vain, the conflict between Israel and Palestine has been the one that has provoked the most vetoes (almost fifty, all by the United States), but it has been Russia (previously the Soviet Union) that has used this power the most. in history: 120 times.
It is also surprising that two countries that are irrelevant in the geopolitics of the 21st century, the United Kingdom and France, are present in the Council’s most select club. «We must understand that the UN was born in the context of the Second World War. It is created to provide a solution to that world, not today’s. The problem is that it cannot even be adapted to the new reality, because the countries that have the right of veto are not going to give it up, and the emerging powers, like India, do not want to eliminate it either, but rather for that privilege to be extended to them,” he analyzes. Noé Cornago, professor of International Relations at the University of the Basque Country.
Blue helmets on the border between Lebanon and Israel. EFE
That the Security Council has to be reformed is not disputed by anyone. How to do it is the million dollar question. «The UN is a reflection of who we are, of our imperfections and contradictions as humans. It is very difficult to govern the coexistence of 8,000 million people, because within it there are democracies and dictatorships, capitalist and communist countries. That’s why it fails. But if that were not the case, if the UN were a club of liberal democracies, it would not work either because many countries would be left out. The problem is that there is no political will to reform it and make it effective,” says Carlos Jiménez, a Peruvian who retired from the United Nations after having worked 37 years at its headquarters in New York, Madrid and Brussels.
Gallach, who was also Javier Solana’s spokesperson in NATO and the Council of the European Union, agrees: «One of the great values of the UN is that all countries are represented in its General Assembly, each with one vote. However, it is undeniable that there is a reactionary offensive by those who do not respect Human Rights and oppress women to interfere in the decisions made in this regard.
Towards World War III?
Perhaps the crux lies in the expectations placed on the UN. “It was not created to take humanity to paradise, but to prevent it from falling into hell,” said the second secretary general of the institution, Dag Hammarskjöld, who died in 1961 in a strange plane crash over what is now Zambia. “His initial task was to avoid a Third World War, and, so far, he has achieved it,” adds Jiménez. Like many others, he is of the opinion that “if the UN did not exist, it would have to be created,” and points out that it has also achieved great achievements since its birth in October 1945.
The UN manages ten peacekeeping operations around the world. REUTERS/EFE/AFP
“Perhaps the most important was the decolonization process of the mid-20th century,” Jiménez details. «And there is more, especially in peacekeeping missions. For example, in Haiti an operation has just been launched to stop the gangs, troops are deployed in the Sahel, and agreements such as the one that has allowed Ukraine to export cereal have been forged within the UN,” adds Gallach. . However, he recognizes that “it is a bad time for multilateral organizations” and sees “the global discouragement and pessimism as understandable.” Jiménez also states, sadly, that “the growing polarization in blocs brings the possibility of a new World War closer.”
First to arrive, last to leave
Fortunately, that is still a fictional scenario, and in real-world conflicts Gallach emphasizes that the rest of the UN agencies “are the first to arrive and the last to leave.” Because one of the organization’s most relevant tasks is to provide humanitarian aid. And a good example of this is the work of UNRWA, the agency for Palestine. More than a hundred of its troops have perished in Gaza since the war between Israel and Hamas broke out, and its facilities have provided shelter to tens of thousands of displaced people.
“The humanitarian arm of the UN saves lives and minimizes the brutal impact of the lack of action by politicians,” says Maria Jesús Vega, spokesperson in Spain for UNHCR, an organization that was born with a three-year mandate designed for the Europe of post-war period and has been there for more than 70 years “with a permanent mandate and working with all types of governments and guerrillas in the most difficult situations to find solutions for refugees around the world.”
Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh. AFP
Unfortunately, there are more and more: “This year we have reached 114 million displaced people, a historical record,” says Vega, who recognizes that working for UN humanitarian agencies is “a source of pride but also frustrating.” Without a doubt, the statistics point to failure, but Vega does not believe it is due to the organization but rather to humanity. «It is a collective failure, because the UN is all of us. We often see how in what should be a space for dialogue and multilateralism, countries look exclusively for their interests and not for the common good,” she says. “And then there are countries like Israel, which does not comply with the resolutions that have repeatedly decreed that the occupation of Palestinian territories is illegal,” adds Cornago.
In any case, all those interviewed agree that the absence of the UN would be much more harmful than its existence. «All the agencies that make it up are often forgotten, and whose function we see only in specific cases, as happened with the World Health Organization and the pandemic. The Sustainable Development Goals have also made the policies of many countries align in search of solutions to the common challenge of climate change,” says Cornago.
Much cheaper than it seems
The United Nations budget for this year amounts to 3.4 billion dollars. To this amount we must add the 6 billion that peacekeeping operations cost. In other words, the two UN allocations cost the world 9.4 billion. They are paid for with the contributions of its members, calculated based on their population and economic power. For this reason, the United States is its main contributor with 22% of the total bill. The minimum is stipulated at 0.001%.
It may seem like a lot, but that perception changes when put into context: the city of Madrid or the Region of Murcian have a budget similar to that of the ten active peace missions – with 86,000 troops – and the first division teams spend more than the UN structure. For its part, Euskadi has approved a budget for 2024 that exceeds that of the entire organization by 5,625 million.