"There are too many times when we still do not come to the defence of civilian populations in need," Jan Egeland, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, said at the outset of the [Security] Council's open debate. "When our response is weak, we appear to wash our hands of our humanitarian responsibilities to protect lives. The world is a safer place for most of us, but it is still a death trap for too many defenceless civilians, men, women and children."

In Iraq, Sudan, Uganda, Somalia, Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, he said, civilians continued to bear the full brunt of armed conflict and terror. Despite all efforts, women were still raped and violated as a matter of course; children were still forcibly recruited; and defenceless civilians continued to be killed - in violation of the most basic principles enshrined in centuries of international lawmaking." [More]

"With tens of thousands of illiterate and unskilled former child soldiers in Afghanistan providing a tempting target for recruitment by one of the war-torn country's numerous armed groups, United Nations agencies need additional funds to continue training projects to reintegrate them as members of a peaceful society." [More]

The New York Times reported yesterday that the Prime Minister of East Timor, Mari Alkatiri, "who has been accused of arming hit squads in recent battles within the country's security forces" and instructing them "to eliminate opponents of the government and of Mr. Alkatiri's political party," has resigned, an action that many see as the turning point in the recent crisis. As the Times points out, it is unclear how long it will take East Timor to fully recover, but it will undoubtedly be accelerated due the presence of the United Nations, which is already on the ground providing vital security and humanitarian assistance.

The UN will soon be sending a police contingent to replace the local police force, which has "virtually evaporated," and may soon send a peacekeeping force to supplement the Australian-led international force. And UN investigators are helping the Timorese Prosecutor-General look into the allegations of wrongdoing against Alkatiri and former Interior Minister Rogerio Lobato, mirroring the efforts of UN investigators in Lebanon who are helping bring to justice those involved in the killing of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

In addition, the United Nations announced yesterday that the World Food Program has distributed a second round of rations to over 53,000 displaced Timorians; UNICEF has resumed a much-needed measles vaccination program; and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has delivered 1,800 tents, 2,400 plastic sheets, 17,000 blankets, and 1,400 fuel storage cans. A second shipment is on its way.

Warren Buffett is a generous man. His gift of over $30 billion in stock to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will nearly double the size of the country's largest charitable organization. As media coverage of the gift has noted, $60 billion is roughly five times the annual budget of the United Nations and its agencies. And as Slate points out, the Foundation's future $1.7 billion annual disbursement requirement is roughly equivalent to UNICEF's annual budget.

Over at Tapped, Matthew Yglesias makes the important point that while gifts of this kind are munificent, there is a limit to philanthropy.

Says Yglesias:

If the foundation really does double its grant-making, that would come to about $1.7 billion per year on global health issues.

By contrast, were the United States government to live up to the commitment it's already made to the United Nations Millenium Development Goals that would involve spending about $77 billion on third world development issues in the first year with disbursements growing proportionately to American GDP.

The Gates Foundation does tremendous work in the developing world, particularly on global health issues. Still, it is no substitute for sustained commitment on part of governments to promote a development agenda set forth in the United Nations Millennium Project.

"To seize the moment of opportunity that the Abuja peace deal offers for ending the suffering in Sudan's Darfur region, African peacekeeping must immediately be bolstered in anticipation of a "substantial" United Nations force and dialogue must start quickly between the local parties, the world body's top peacekeeping official said today.

"The situation in Darfur remains very fragile - there is an agreement and that's a major achievement - but it's an agreement that opens a window, and that's a window that needs to be seized," Jean-Marie Guehenno, Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations told the press after briefing the Security Council on the results of his recent assessment mission to Sudan." [More]

It appears that a potentially catastrophic United Nations shutdown has been averted, and all Benny Avni of the New York Sun can do is lament. Indeed, he seems to be parroting Ambassador Bolton, who told reporters yesterday, "While the expenditure cap is going to come off this week one way or another, it would not be right to conclude from that that we made substantial progress or any progress at all on management reform."

Both Avni, Ambassador Bolton, and others may now look to Congress to impose spending restrictions where the Bush administration would not. And as the mid-term elections loom closer, some conservatives in Congress may take their cues from Bolton and repeat the canard that there has been no progress on reform.

In fact, there has been substantial progress. The Peace Building Commission opened up for business last week to help coordinate post-conflict reconstruction efforts around the globe. Also last week, the New Human Rights Council held its inaugural session in Vienna.

In terms of management reform, there has been a flurry of activity on mandate review. The United States is the driving force behind Secretary General Annan's call for a review of all mandates more than five years old. This is a complicated task, but so far steady progress has been made. Further, there has been tremendous progress on accountability and oversight at the General Secretariat. The United States was instrumental in establishing a new Ethics Office at the United Nations as well as strengthening the capacity of the Office of Internal Oversight Services.

It is a wonder why Ambassador Bolton would disparage his own good efforts by minimizing this progress.

"The United States will drop its insistence that rich nations withhold funds from the U.N. budget next month unless management reforms are enacted, U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said on Friday." [Full story]

UPDATE: From the Better World Campaign: The Partnership for a Secure America, a bi-partisan group of former high ranking foreign policy officials, ran an advertisement in The New York Times calling for strong U.S. leadership at the UN to build consensus on reforms and for continued funding of the organization at this critical time, addressing the vital role the UN is playing to confront global problems and in foster peace. See the advertisement. (pdf)

"United National officials were on Monday trying to break a diplomatic impasse after the Sudanese government suspended their operations in the western region of Darfur.

The Sudanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a statement issued on Saturday, said it had instructed local authorities in Darfur to suspend all activities of the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) in the three Darfur states, except those of two affiliated agencies: the UN Children's Fund (Unicef) and the World Food Programme which provide life-saving aid to millions of people in the region." [More]

"There are few issues on which there is greater consensus, or higher expectations, than on the responsibility of the United Nations to help States and societies recover from the devastation of war," Secretary-General Kofi Annan declared as the Commission's Organizational Committee began its inaugural session.

"The Commission represents a symbol of both hope and perseverance: hope for the many millions of people throughout the world who are striving to keep their societies on the fragile road to peace; and perseverance, because you have overcome considerable difficulties to get this new and vital endeavour up and running."

"A World Health Organization investigation showed that the H5N1 virus mutated slightly in an Indonesian family cluster on Sumatra island, but bird flu experts insisted Friday it did not increase the possibility of a human pandemic." [More]

A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary

PSD Blog covers World Refugee Day: "UNHCR, Nike, Microsoft and Right to Play chose World Refugee Day to launch ninemillion.org, a campaign "to create a global community dedicated to giving the world's refugee youth the chance to learn and play." The elegantly designed website features personal refugee stories and a 30-second public service announcement from Brazilian soccer star, and UNDP Goodwill Ambassador, Ronaldo. Nike has donated 40,000 soccer balls specially designed to endure harsh conditions at refugee camps."

Mcjoan at Daily Kos asks if Sen. Santorum trumped UN inspectors in Iraq.

Michelle Malkin repeats conservative canards about the United Nations Small Arms Review Conference.

Mojo has more on the UN, the NRA, and small arms: "the NRA tends, quite often, to stoke and inflame conservative fears that the UN really is plotting to erect some sinister world government or other that will take away all our guns."

To believe conspiracy theorists like National Rifle Association president Wayne LaPierre, the United Nations Small Arms Review Conference is one step on the slippery slope toward global mind control. But back here on planet earth, the conference will address best practices for combating the illicit trafficking of small arms by transnational criminal organizations.

The conference will say nothing about the lawful ownership of guns by citizens in the United States or elsewhere. Rather, it will bring member countries together to forge a common strategy to combat gun runners and their pernicious effect on global security. Among other nefarious activities, criminals that profit from the illicit sale of small arms are responsible for putting lightweight AK 47's in the hands of small children in Liberia and Northern Uganda and pairing stockpiles of weapons with militias in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Further, according to Interpol, the same transnational organized criminal groups that profit from the sale of arms are also likely to form cozy business relations with terrorist organizations like al Qaeda.

The fact is, any action taken to impede the UN's efforts to curb the illegal trafficking of arms is a danger to millions around the globe.

[Ed. note: also read Statement by Ambassador Stuart Holliday, U.S. Alternate Representative for Special Political Affairs to the United Nations on Small Arms and Light Weapons, in the Security Council, February 17, 2005]

Late last week the UN Secretary-General announced that, in response to requests from both President Bush and the Iraqi government, the United Nations will provide strong support in developing an "international compact" for Iraq.

The "compact," a framework for providing international assistance, is the latest in a string of rarely-reported UN efforts to improve the situation on the ground in Iraq. In the lead-up to the parliamentary elections last December, the UN provided expert advice to the Iraq's Independent Electoral Commission, established 6,000 polling stations, trained over 150,000 election workers, and accredited more than 200,000 election observers. UN special envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, helped to build local consensus and form the necessary coalitions within Iraq for a peaceful transition of power from the U.S.-led occupying forces to an Iraqi government. Following the January 2005 elections, the UN established the International Assistance Program for Constitution-making that provided critical support during the drafting of the Iraqi constitution. And, most recently, the new UN special envoy, Ashraf Qazi led negotiations with anti-American Shi'ite leaders that resulted in Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari rescinding his bid for a new term and ended a month-long struggle that had kept Iraq from forming a government of national unity.

The new "compact" promises to stimulate even more progress. The UN was central to similar efforts in Afghanistan, raising billions of dollars for relief and reconstruction and forging an international agreement to improve security, adherence to the rule of law, human rights, and economic and social development. In large part due to international assistance, Afghanistan has its first democratically elected parliament in over 20 years; 4 million Afghan refuges have returned; 5 million children are back at school; 60,000 combatants have rejoined society; and the economy has grown steadily.

"The chairman of an upcoming United Nations-organized conference looking into ways of curbing the illegal trade in small arms said today that stepped-up action is needed to tackle the global scourge and follow-up on a Programme of Action endorsed by all Member States in 2001.

The Small Arms Review Conference, to be held in New York from 26 June to 7 July, will involve more than 2,000 representatives from governments, international and regional organizations and civil society, the Conference President-designate, Sri Lankan Ambassador Prasad Kariyawasam, told reporters." [More]

At WorldNetDaily, Henry Lamb fumes about the United Nations' encroachment on American sovereignty. Predictably for diatribes of this nature, Lamb targets Kyoto and the Law of the Seas -- two international treaties, incidentally, to which the United States has yet to accede. But until now, never have I seen the anti-UN crowd take offense to the United States Department of Agriculture's National Animal Identification System for American livestock and poultry.

The appropriately named writer hyperventilates, "What rarely makes the headlines are the incessant efforts to expand global rule through endless treaties, agreements, commissions and agencies... The National Animal Identification System now being developed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture also originated in the international community. The influence of the U.N. on domestic policy goes far beyond the headlines. This insidious force is sucking the sovereignty from our nation with the support of Congress and most Americans - who fail to see the danger."

As I see it, the only real danger here is that ideologues writing for WorldNetDaily might scuttle efforts to keep Americans safe from mad cow.

"World Refugee Day kicked off Tuesday with a message of hope from UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the launch of a major UNHCR fund-raising campaign focused on youth and sports, and celebrations in the Asia-Pacific region.

In his special message, Annan said that while the global refugee population was at its lowest level since 1980 and UNHCR had helped millions of people repatriate or resettle in a country of asylum, more than half those that the refugee agency cares for around the world have spent over five years in exile." [More]

In case you missed these:

Strained relations between U.N., U.S. are bad for everyone

"During the late 1990s, congressional conservatives led by Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., vowed to starve the U.N. unless it acceded to a long list of "reforms." In September 2002, President Bush asserted that the United Nations would become "irrelevant" should it fail to join the U.S. in disarming Iraq. You have to wonder why the U.N. is still in business. The short answer is: Because the United States can't do without it.

John Bolton's latest teapot tempest

"The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, last week petulantly aimed a blast of verbal buckshot at U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Mark Malloch Brown. In his blast, he grotesquely distorted what the U.N. official had actually asserted in public criticisms of the Bush administration and some Republican-friendly media."

CNN: "The takeover of Somalia's capital by Islamic militias could lead to a regional conflict unless the international community resolves Somalia's 15-year-old civil war, the top U.N. envoy to the country warned Monday.... U.N. officials are concerned that the increased fighting could create a new humanitarian crisis, and the United States fears the country could become a new haven for the al Qaeda terror network."

In the midst of a long-winded diatribe against Secretary General Kofi Annan, Claudia Rosett manages to assert that no reforms have followed in the wake of the oil-for-food scandal. "Last year, the general hope, and Annan's promise, was that the exposure of Oil-for-Food corruption, and a host of other U.N. scandals ... would lead to genuine U.N. reform," writes Rosett in the National Review Online. "The scandals are still with us. But there has been no major reform." No reform? Please.

In April 2004 Annan appointed a super group of internationally revered financial and criminal law experts, led by former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, to investigate alleged corruption in the Oil for Food program. Since then, Annan has overseen a number of internal and institutional reforms to ensure that the Secretariat will be up to the task should member states once again ask the Secretariat to administer a program as complicated as Oil for Food.

For one, Annan created a new ethics office to oversee conflict-of-interest issues and to implement new financial disclosure requirements. Like new whistle-blower protections implemented by Annan, these disclosure requirements are far more exhaustive than those required of United States government officials. Also at Annan's urging, the 2005 Summit Outcome document included a provision to significantly strengthen the UN's Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS). In December, the General Assembly voted to add 39 new positions to the OIOS's audit and investigatory capacity.

Oversight and accountability are basic facts of life at the United Nations. Employees who have been accused of corruption now skate on thinner ice than prior to the Volcker Report. Indeed, Annan has stripped UN employees accused of corruption (like the Oil for Food programz's former administrator, Benon Sevon) of their diplomatic immunity in anticipation of criminal trials.

To a large degree, the United Nations has behaved as a responsible bureaucracy should when accused of a scandal. Other bureaucracies accused of mismanaging funds could stand to learn from the Secretary General.

Damage to the once pristine habitats of the deep oceans by pollution, litter and overfishing is running out of control, the United Nations warned yesterday. In a report that indicates that time is running out to save them, the UN said humankind's exploitation of the the deep seas and oceans was "rapidly passing the point of no return".

Last year some 85 million tonnes of wild fish were pulled from the global oceans, 100 million sharks and related species were butchered for their fins, some 250,000 turtles became tangled in fishing gear, and 300,000 seabirds, including 100,000 albatrosses, were killed by illegal longline fishing. [More]

Alertnet: "The United Nations launched a drive on Thursday to "disaster-proof" schools to prevent children being crushed in earthquakes and swept away in floods.

Tragedies like last year's Pakistan quake, when collapsing classrooms killed 16,000 children, underlined the urgent need for action, U.N. disaster reduction chief Salvano Briceno said.

The two-pronged campaign will also push governments to make risk reduction part of the curriculum.

"More than 200 million people are affected by disasters every year, a third of them are often children ... Educating about disasters can make the difference between life and death," Briceno told a launch ceremony in Paris."

A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary

Air America Radio notes renewed calls for Guantanamo's closure.

CJR Daily discusses the "Elephant in the Newsroom" known as Guantanamo: "A quick Lexis-Nexis search for "Guantanamo" proves just how inadequate newspapers have been to the task of telling this story. Nearly every article that appears is a breaking news story about a new hunger strike, a court battle over forced feeding, or an organization like the UN voicing concern about the detainees."

Coalition for Darfur links to an AP piece describing "thousands of civilian deaths" documented in Darfur.

Joshua Landis writes: "The new UN investigation into Rafiq Al Hariri's murder is expected to indict Syrian leaders."

Paper Chase says that "UN rights experts call on Egypt to preserve independent judiciary."

Given the scale of killings, rape, looting and destruction of villages in Darfur, Sudan the Chief Prosecutor of the United Nations-backed criminal court said today he anticipates the prosecution of a sequence of cases, rather than a single case, of possible war crimes in the conflict between the Khartoum Government, allied militia and rebels.

"Identifying those persons with the greatest responsibility for the most serious crimes in Darfur is a key challenge for the investigation," Luis Moreno Ocampo, of the International Criminal Court (ICC), said as he presented his latest report (pdf) to the Security Council this afternoon. "The complexity of the conflict in Darfur exacerbates this challenge, given that it involves multiple parties, varying over time throughout the different states and localities." [More]

Unrest in Dili. © UNHCR/S.Martins

"The international community should not have pulled out of East Timor so quickly, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said yesterday. Mr Annan earlier announced plans for a major new mission to the troubled nation.

But a UN mission substantially larger than the 2000-strong Australia-led force would take at least six months to prepare, Mr Annan said.

"The sad events of recent weeks reflect shortcomings not only on the part of the Timorese leadership, but also on the part of the international community in inadequately sustaining Timor-Leste's (East Timor's) nation-building process," Mr Annan told the UN Security Council. [Read more]

Also read this letter to the editor from the International Herald Tribune:

Losing East Timor

Who lost East Timor? Jeff Kingston, in "Nation rebuilding" (June 10-11) says "The United Nations bears responsibility for leaving before it finished the job." That's not correct, and we need to make sure the record is set straight before this becomes part of the received wisdom.

Decisions on a UN operation of this kind are the responsibility not of the whole United Nations but of the Security Council or, if you prefer, the five permanent members, who each have a veto.

The Security Council took the decision to terminate the UN military presence in East Timor, against the wishes and in spite of the pleas of Secretary General Kofi Annan that a small military force be left in place. Had he been listened to, the tragedy now taking place could have been avoided.

Frank Peel, Geneva

Crunching numbers provided by the State Department's annual report on voting patterns in the United Nations, Fred Gedrich concludes that General Assembly member states vote against the United States 75% of the time. So doing, he argues that this voting pattern evidences a chronic anti-Americanism at the United Nations. Alas, he fails to impart a rather significant disclaimer to that figure: it does not include resolutions reached by consensus.

Says the report (pdf):

"When consensus resolutions are factored in as votes identical to those of the United States, a much higher measure of agreement with U.S. positions is reached. This figure (77.6 percent in 2005), which more accurately reflects the work of the General Assembly, is below the 85-88 percent range recorded since the statistic was first included in this report in 1993. It was 81.3 percent in 2004, 80.7 percent in 2003, 83.0 percent in 2002, 85.0 percent in 2001, 87.6 percent in 2000, 86.4 percent in 1999, 88.3 percent in 1998, 87.3 percent in 1997, 87.3 percent also in 1996, 88.2 percent in 1995, 88.8 percent in 1994, and 88.3 percent in 1993." (emphasis mine)

Voting coincidences with the United States are not static statistics. Indeed, ten years ago (discounting consensus resolutions) the rest of the world voted with the United States at frequency 25% greater than it is today. A dose of constructive engagement with the developing world would go a long way to raise this number to levels achieved in the mid 1990s.

For further evidence of supposed anti-Americanism at the UN, Gedrich also writes, "Over strong U.S. objections, assembly members ... elevated Iran's nuclear weapon-seeking terrorist state to Vice Chair of the Disarmament Commission." This is extremely misleading. The UN's Disarmament Commission is a small and not very active forum that meets for three weeks in a year. Elections to the commission's leadership happen by acclimation. If the Bush administration thought it worth their while to prevent Iran from attaining a leadership position on the commission, Ambassador Bolton or one of his representatives could have simply raised some objections and called for a vote. Needless to say, this did not happen.

Fact checking, it would seem, is not much of a priority at The American Enterprise.

The Pittsburgh Tribune Review devotes Sunday editorial space to Mark Malloch Brown's so-called "hissy-fit" last week. Though the irony is probably lost on the Tribune's editorial board, their brief exposition is Malloch Brown's thoughtful critique of US-UN relations made manifest.

The Tribune hits the tired notes and common distortions frequently associated with conservative screeds. (E.g., the authors issue the baseless claim that "peacekeepers' sexual abuse of refugees, including children, keeps surfacing while offenders face neither trial nor punishment." In fact, over 140 personnel have been punished thus far, including six commanders.) Nonetheless, the Tribune cannot let the facts obscure the truth as they would like it to be.

I doubt that the Tribune-Review actually thought through some of the consequences of a United States withdrawal from the world body. For one, I wonder if they considered how American interests in the Middle East would be sacrificed by a whole scale abandonment of the United Nations.

For example, it has been a longtime goal of United States foreign policy to disentangle Syria from Lebanon. This week, the lead UN investigator into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri released a CSI style report detailing the assassins' tools and methods. This report follows a separate investigation into the complicity of Syrian authorities in the killing and subsequent cover-up. It also comes just one year after a UN team concluded that Syria had complied with a Franco-American Security Council resolution to withdraw all its military forces from Lebanon.

After a 29 year occupation, this was a major victory not only democratic reformers in Lebanon, but for global security and American interests in the Middle East. That the Tribune editorial board would choose to ignore this achievement is evidence of Malloch Brown's observation (pdf) that conservative media outlets seek to keep the accomplishments of the United Nations a mystery to large swaths of the country.

Media Matters: "In response to recent remarks by Mark Malloch Brown, the deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, who criticized "U.S. administrations of both parties" for allowing the U.N.'s "loudest detractors, such as Rush Limbaugh and Fox News," to define the international organization for the "U.S. heartland," Limbaugh and various other Fox News media figures smeared Brown, referring to him, in turn, as a "pointy-headed, elitist liberal" and "a phony."

The United Nations is launching a global appeal for funds to support 100,000 refugees in East Timor. The number of people displaced from their homes in East Timor's capital, Dili, is still rising. At least 65,000 people are in camps around Dili while an estimated 35,000 have fled to outer districts, the ABC reports.

The United Nations is launching a flash appeal in New York to raise money to feed and shelter those in the camps for months if needed. The UN Development Program is hoping to raise at least $28 million, and is confident the international community will pitch in. [More]

Sebastian Mallaby: "Last month President Bush issued a rare apology. "Saying 'Bring it on,' kind of tough talk, you know, that sent the wrong signal," he confessed. "I think in certain parts of the world it was misinterpreted."

Well done, Mr. President, you've understood that bluster can backfire. Now how about sharing this insight with your ambassador to the United Nations?"

A U.N.-backed investigator reported Saturday "considerable progress" in his probe of a former Lebanese prime minister's assassination, and said most of his work could be wrapped up in several months.

The second report from Belgian prosecutor Serge Brammertz's investigators said Syria -- which had earlier been accused of obstructing the probe into Rafik Hariri's death -- has cooperated in a "generally satisfactory" manner. And the team sought an extension for up to one year to finish its work." [More]

"United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said today the reported death in Iraq of the Jordanian insurgent Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was a "relief" since such a "such a heinous and dangerous man" will no longer be around to continue harming Iraqis, even though violence was unlikely to end with his elimination in the war-torn country." [More]

During his speech in New York on Tuesday, Deputy Secretary General Mark Malloch Brown gave one of the most astute summaries (pdf) of US-UN relations that I have read in a very long time. It was at once complimentary, prodding and constructive. And as Malloch Brown said at the outset, it was intended as "a sincere and constructive critique of U.S. policy towards the UN by a friend and admirer." Unfortunately, Ambassador John Bolton did not see it that way.

Yesterday, Bolton called Kofi Annan and demanded that he "personally and publicly" repudiate Malloch Brown. But according to Annan's spokesman, Stepane Dujarric, Annan will not. And rightly so. There is nothing remotely insulting about Malloch Brown's remarks.

To be sure, he does not gloss over the current hostility between the United States and the United Nations that permeates Turtle Bay, calling it "an unhappy marriage." But like a good partner, he clearly communicates what the United States could do to make the relationship a more binding one.

For one, he recognizes the centrality of the United States to the United Nations, and calls for more, not less, engagement. He also suggests that the United States be more open to compromise during the on-going management reform push. That does not mean that the Secretariat and Washington have opposing goals for reform, just the opposite is the case. But because Malloch Brown is such a staunch advocate for reform, he understands that it can only be achieved through a process whereby donor countries, most of all the United States, work with the developing world to broker compromise.

So far, Bolton's zero-sum approach to UN reform has not achieved desired reform goals. Like a good friend should, Malloch Brown says so.

Finally, there is something terribly distracting about Ambassador Bolton's remarks yesterday. Right now, Britain's Emyr Jones Parry is leading a Security Council mission to Sudan to cajole Khartoum into accepting a UN peacekeeping force for Darfur. They will visit refugee camps near El Fashir, and witness first hand the destruction that has been meted out just across the Darfur-Chad border in Abeche. That Bolton decided not to join Jones-Parry on the trip, and instead used his perch in New York to launch invectives against the Secretary General is unfortunate. Like Bolton, the headlines ought to be in Sudan right now.

"The United Nations said on Wednesday that seven of its peacekeepers, who were kidnapped in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) 10 days earlier, were well and that indirect contact had been established with their captors.

"We know the UN peacekeepers are in good health. We are in indirect but regular contact with the kidnappers and every effort is being made to ensure they are freed as soon as possible," Kemal Saiki, spokesman for the UN peacekeeping mission in the DRC, told reporters.

"These militia fighters are criminals, not fanatics. They are trying to reopen their trade routes. They are asking for money in return for the UN peacekeepers but they know it is in their interest to keep them in good health," a UN observer told reporters on condition of anonymity.

The seven Nepalese UN soldiers were kidnapped on May 28 during a joint operation by the UN forces and the DRC army to dislodge militia fighters from an area of the violence-prone northeastern province of Ituri." [Read more]

A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary

Armchair Generalist writes, "The United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) has released a historical summary on Iraq's chemical weapons program that documents its start in 1971 and follows the work conducted through the 1980s and 1990s.

At the Washington Note, Jeremy Kahn posts an interesting entry about "non-verbal politics".

Treehugger covers the UN's World Environment Day: "This year they chose to highlight something we don't hear about often enough: Natural deserts and drylands also need to be protected. These areas that most people consider to be almost "dead" are in fact vital ecosystems."

Michelle Malkin posts another anti-UN diatribe with a headline that tells you everything about her level of discourse: "Hey, U.N.: Boo-Freaking-Hoo."

A thoroughly bizarre story appeared in Rupert Murdoch's Australian tabloid, the Herald Sun yesterday. Reporters Rob Taylor and Olivia Rondonuwu suggest that the UN mission in East Timor tried to cover up a May 25 massacre in which 12 unarmed East Timorese police officers were gunned down by a group of renegade Timorse soldiers. The reporters base this claim on a leaked email in which the Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary General in East Timor allegedly instructs UN employees against cooperating with an Australian investigation into the massacre.

But the government of East Timor, however embattled at the moment, retains the sovereign right to investigate crimes that take place on its own soil. To that end, UNOTIL has offered to make evidence it may possess available to Timorese authorities. But absent permission from the government of East Timor, UNOTIL cannot turn over evidence (such as autopsy reports, statements, and testimony) to a third party.

To be sure, Australia wields great influence in East Timor. So if Canberra decides to make this a priority, it can surely convince Dili to give UNOTIL permission to work with the Australian Federal Police investigating the incident. And for the record, the Spokesman for the Secretary General confirmed to me that if authorized by East Timor, UNOTIL will turn over any evidence it may have to the Australians.

"United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today proposed a standing forum led by all 191 Member States which governments could use to share ideas and discuss best practices and policies related to international migration and how this phenomenon ties in with global development."

In his Forward to the report, he also said that such a forum would "allow governments to establish a common understanding, based upon the best evidence, on the areas of migration policymaking that have the greatest potential to contribute to development."

"Most of all, such a forum would maintain our focus on international migration issues, while signalling that international migration is a normal but crucial element in the development process." [More]

Amidst a post on Haditha and the American military's ability to investigate itself, Instapundit's Glenn Reynolds can't resist landing a cheap shot against the UN, which he claims has been unwilling to investigate abuses in peacekeeping missions. The opposite is true.

Since reports of sexual abuse surfaced in the Congo in 2004 there have been at least 291 investigations into peacekeeping mission personnel. According to the latest annual peacekeeping report, published March 2006, as a result of these investigations, 16 civilians have been fired, along with 16 members of formed police units. Further, some 137 military personnel were repatriated on disciplinary grounds, including six commanders.

(For reference, in April, Human Rights First along with Human Rights Watch and the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at the New York University School of Law documented (pdf) some 330 cases in which over 600 U.S. military personnel are credibly alleged to have abused detainees since the start of the Afghan war. So far, only 54 have been convicted by court-martial.)

Beyond the statistics, it's noteworthy that the Secretary General tapped Jordan's Prince Zeid Ra'ad Al-Hussein to lead the UN's drive to increase oversight and accountability mechanisms to prevent future abuses. Prince Zeid is a global authority on international humanitarian law, and was the first president of the International Criminal Court's governing body. His name brought immense credibility to a March 2005 report that recommended wide ranging reforms, including setting up special Conduct and Discipline units at the eight largest peace keeping missions.

As we saw with the 372nd Military Police Company in Abu Ghraib and Moroccan peacekeepers in the Democratic Republic, soldiers in conflict zones can sometimes commit terrible human rights violations. Contra Glenn Reynolds, the United Nations seems to understand this, and has taken allegations of abuse serious enough to swiftly implement broad reforms in its peace-keeping operations.

"A United Nations Security Council delegation begins talks today with Sudanese government officials to press demands for a UN peacekeeping force to help end fighting in the western region of Darfur.

The 15-person delegation, led by the U.K. ambassador to the UN, Emry Jones Parry, is also scheduled to visit the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, for talks with Africa Union officials before traveling to el-Fasher in Darfur on June 9.

The Sudanese government last month agreed to allow a UN assessment team to visit Darfur to prepare for a transition from the 7,000-member African Union peacekeeping force to a UN contingent of as many as 20,000 troops. The Sudanese authorities haven't yet agreed to a UN deployment." [Full story]

In his recent testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Ambassador Bolton announced that the U.S. is "prepared to consider" a 90-day extension of the spending cap that threatens to disrupt invaluable UN operations at the end of this month.

However, he also acknowledged that "it hasn't met with a lot of support," and that "it's an indication ... that we're not trying to force this to an issue on the 30th [of June]."

Ambassador Bolton hits the nail on the head. It is clear to nearly every party involved that such a proposal is very unlikely to be accepted. Member States would not want to engage in this complicated debate as the 2006 U.S. Congressional campaigns hit the home stretch or in the same time frame as the annual General Assembly meeting, where nations will also be hotly debating the selection of the next Secretary-General. Doing so would only make matters more contentious in what is already a highly charged environment. Some have even suggested that this proposal is just what the Ambassador said it was, "an indication," a non-starter intended to make the U.S. appear more amenable to compromise while painting the G-77 into a corner.

For quite a while (and again at the recent Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing) Senators on both sides of the aisle have pressed the U.S. mission on what would be a far more effective and responsible strategy - clearly delineating the reforms that would satisfy those who fought for the budget cap. Unfortunately the Administration has yet to do so.

The battle is pitched at the United Nations. Now is the time for reasoned diplomacy and clearly delineated goals, if we are to avoid a head-on collision that threatens to paralyze the UN, a situation that benefits no nation.

© Binh Thuan, Thien Anh Huynh / Vietnam / UNEP

"World Environment Day, commemorated each year on 5 June, is one of the principal vehicles through which the United Nations stimulates worldwide awareness of the environment and enhances political attention and action. The World Environment Day theme selected for 2006 is Deserts and Desertification and the slogan is Don't Desert Drylands! The slogan emphasizes the importance of protecting drylands, which cover more than 40% of the planet's surface. This ecosystem is home to one-third of the world's people who are more vulnerable members of society." [Read more]

"The upcoming national election in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is not only a huge logistical undertaking but could shape the future of the rest of Africa, says former U.S. ambassador Bill Swing, who now heads up the 17,000-man United Nations peacekeeping force MONUC.

Success in the Congo will change the face of Africa," Swing told the Washington File during an interview in his office at MONUC headquarters, located in central Kinshasa."

During a diplomatic career that spanned four decades, Swing served as U.S. ambassador to five African nations. After retiring in 2001, he agreed to head up MONUC, the U.N. peacekeeping force mandated by the 1999 Lusaka Accords that ended a war that had embroiled the DRC and seven other nations.

In December 2002, political factions warring within DRC signed an agreement in Sun City, South Africa, that established a transition government and set a timetable for national elections.

"Everything about DRC is huge and significant," Swing said. The country has numerous other nations bordering it, is one of the wealthiest in mineral resources and is culturally and ethnically diverse. For example, with 58 million people, the DRC has the largest French-speaking population after France.

"So, the effect of successful [July 30] elections here in unleashing the political and economic energy of this nation could have an enormous impact on the rest of Africa," Swing said. [Link]

A sampling of United Nations related blog commentary

Tony Ferguson previews World Environment Day.

Steve Clemons suggests that "Iran will continue to try and split the five UN Security Council members."

Abhi at Sepia Mutiny blogs about AIDS in India.

Derek Chollet discusses Tony Blair's "far-reaching" ideas for UN Reform.

Captain's Quarters, a leading conservative blog, uses a standard anti-UN tactic: make gross generalizations about UN peacekeepers from a few bad examples. Captain Ed might want to take a look at this RAND study (pdf) which suggests the UN is better suited for peacekeeping missions than the U.S., finding it not only more efficient but also more effective.

Instapundit links to a Max Boot piece rebutted here by UN Dispatch's new featured blogger, Mark Goldberg.

Spork in the Drawer has more on Boot: "Boot conveniently fails to note that mercenaries don't fall under any laws or rules." (Hat tip: Busy, Busy, Busy)

"On the final day of a special session on the fight against H.I.V. and AIDS, United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan delivered a gloomy assessment, saying the world was losing the battle.

"The epidemic continues to outpace us," he told a jam-packed session of the General Assembly today. "There are more new infections than ever before; more deaths than ever before; more women and girls infected than ever before."

Mr. Annan, who is from Ghana and has made fighting H.I.V. a priority of his tenure, acknowledged some areas of progress since the last U.N. special session on AIDS in 2001: seven times as many people around the world now have access to treatment, he said, and in some African nations, the rate of infection is declining.

But he said that if countries "don't step up the fight drastically," the world would not be able to "reverse the tide." He called the spread of the disease "the single greatest reversal in the history of human development." [More]

In Wednesday's Los Angeles Times, Max Boot revisits the idea of sending mercenaries to Darfur in lieu of U.N. peacekeepers. This is something of a pet idea among a category of foreign policy thinkers in the United States who are generally skeptical about humanitarian interventions, but nonetheless want to "do something" about Darfur. Nikolas Gvosdev, editor of realist journal The National Interest, for example, raised this idea at a Cato Institute event in March.

Advocates of sending mercenaries to Darfur don't seem to mind that, in practice, mercenaries around the world tend to be former military officers from apartheid South African army. They also don't seem to mind that these mercenaries would operate under no jurisdiction or accountability mechanisms, and would serve in Darfur only as long as their shareholders consider it profitable. In point of fact, any mission to Darfur will last many years. Some two million people have been displaced, and somehow need to make it home. To that end, I sincerely doubt that private military contractors will have the kind of staying power as blue helmets, which once invited to a region are known to stay until the job is done--even if that takes decades.

The main hurdle facing peacekeeping operations is in their initial deployment. Every time the Security Council authorizes a peacekeeping operation, the Secretary General must convince member countries to pony up the troops. Indeed, Kofi Annan has likened this part of his job to that of a volunteer fire chief who must beg for firefighters, trucks and hoses. In the case of Darfur, Annan told reporters earlier this week that planning for a peacekeeping force was fairly advanced, and that pending contributions from member states, troops could arrive in Darfur by September. Of course, member states could be stingy and deployment could be delayed. What Boot fails to mention in his column is that this fault does not lie with U.N. itself, but of member countries that duplicitously decry the violence in Darfur, but are unwilling to contribute forces to the last best option for stabilizing the region.

"President Bush said Thursday that the standoff over Iran's suspected nuclear program is headed for the U.N. Security Council if Tehran continues to refuse to halt uranium enrichment.

"We'll see whether or not that is the firm position of their government," President Bush said after a meeting with his Cabinet at the White House. "If they continue their obstinance, if they continue to say to the world 'We really don't care what your opinion is," then the world is going to act in concert." [Full story]

NYT: "Stopping the epidemic of AIDS will require $22 billion a year by 2008 and possibly more in the following years, officials of the United Nations AIDS program said Wednesday. The $22 billion is nearly triple the $8.3 billion spent last year by all sources, including governments and the private sector.

Urging that countries spend more, Secretary General Kofi Annan said a costlier and more sustained effort was needed because AIDS "has spread further, faster and with more catastrophic long-term effects than any other disease."

"It took the world far too long to wake up" to a pandemic that has infected more than 60 million people, of whom more than 25 million have died, Mr. Annan said."