"Lebanon is making speedy progress towards recovery after the destructive conflict between Israel and Hizbollah this summer and humanitarian agencies are preparing to close down or transfer their activities to relevant Government authorities or development agencies, the United Nations officials reported today.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP), which has taken the logistics lead in arranging cargo movements, will wind up those operations by 15 October. Since commercial traffic has resumed, WFP will support other agencies' transport needs and those of non-governmental organizations' (NGOs) through commercial means." More

Reuters: "Some 2.6 billion people in the world, mainly in Africa and Asia, lack access to basic sanitation, increasing the risk of diarrhea and other diseases fatal to children, said a U.N. report released on Thursday.

UNICEF, the U.N. children's fund, in a study on water and sanitation in developing nations, concluded that U.N. goals could be met on clean water, especially in urban areas, but the same was not true for access to the crudest of toilets."

The night before last I was privy to a sneak preview of an ambitious foreign policy manifesto that is being rolled out on Capitol Hill today. The plan, Forging a World of Liberty Under Law: U.S. National Security in the 21st Century, is the product of a two-year long series of meetings of a bi-partisan brain trust of foreign policy and national security experts convened at the Woodrow Wilson school. Under the steering of Anne-Marie Slaughter and G. John Ickenberry, the Princeton Project on National Security has attempted to comprehensively outline a sustainable 21st Century American foreign policy. As Dr. Slaughter put it last night, the group's inspiration was to create the intellectual equivalent to George Kennan's famous X Article in Foreign Affairs, but updated for our time.

They may have come close.

The report is wide-ranging. And in terms of United States engagement with the world, the group recognizes the centrality of multilateral institutions to promoting American security interests. To that end, it calls for a widespread reform of the security and peace apparatus of the United Nations. Some of these reforms draw directly from the 2004 U.N. High Level Panel report that recommended expanding the Security Council to make it more geographically diverse. It also suggests developing mechanisms for the United Nations to authorize the use of force retroactively in cases demanding immediate action or when political stalemate has effectively blocked all action.

But perhaps the most eye-catching recommendation is that an expansion of the Council should correspond with an abolition of the veto on resolutions authorizing direct action in response to a crisis. The current veto process, the report argues, does not serve the interest of the United States. "America does not need it to block action of which we do not approve; we are almost always pushing the Security Council to take action, rather than not, and in those cases where we are unpersuaded of the wisdom of a particular course, we prefer to use diplomacy rather than the veto. Instead, the veto is a license for prevarication, obstructionism, and disillusionment. The veto should instead be replaced by a supermajority vote - of perhaps three quarters of voting members - in an enlarged Security Council." The document then stresses that the veto can be used to block politically motivated condemnatory resolutions.

The entire document is well worth a read. If nothing else, it will inspire lively debate over the role of multilateral institutions in American national security.

"More than half of all children who do not go to school are girls. Achieving universal primary education is a Millennium Development Goal and one of UNICEF's primary objectives.

At a panel discussion organized by the US Mission to the United Nations in New York, UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman gave a keynote address on the vital importance of educating girls in the developing world." More

"The United Nations atomic watchdog agency has called on all Member States to provide political, financial, and technical support to prevent nuclear and radiological terrorism.

The call, which also seeks necessary funds for the Nuclear Security Fund, came in a resolution passed by the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) General Conference, which was attended by more than 100 Member States and ended last week." More

In his op-ed lambasting the "ineffective" United Nations, the Miami Herald's Carlos Alberto Montaner seems to forget that the United Nations has a Security Council with five veto-wielding members. Throughout the editorial he repeatedly cites the large membership of the General Assembly as a sui generis barrier to solving international crises, but he fails to ever mention the smaller Security Council, which is the United Nations organ entrusted to take on global crises as they emerge.

Says Montaner, "The United Nations is a costly, clumsy and corrupt bureaucracy that has not achieved any of the objectives entrusted to it at the time of its creation. The idea of establishing the principle of a majority -- one vote to every nation -- to settle the international clashes and crashes was foolish. How can Brazil's vote have the same value as the vote of the Seychelle Islands?"

Further demonstrating his seeming unfamiliarity Security Council--and the United Nations system--Montaner writes, "When a crisis occurs in the world, the principal actors solve, alleviate or deflect it by holding conversations in the corridors or negotiations behind closed doors, and then taking the outcome to the plenum of the assembly so that it may be approved. And if not even this can be accomplished -- as happened during the civil war in the Balkans in former Yugoslavia -- the organization is bypassed..."

It is the 15 member Security Council, not the 192 member General Assembly, that works to solve international crises like the 34 day war in Lebanon this summer, or the recent flare up in East Timor. Though it would undermine his argument, it would be appropriate to make this distinction if one's principal objection to the United Nations is that its members, taken as a whole, cannot work together to solve international crises.

Finally, Montaner asks, "Objectively speaking, what good is the United Nations? To serve as a worldwide stage for a clown like Chavez?"

Since Hugo Chavez' rant last week, this has been a favorite refrain from the anti-UN crowd. But Hugo Chavez does not speak for the United Nations, he speaks for Hugo Chavez. If one national leaders' personal distain for the leader of another member state proves that the United Nations is fatally flawed, then it would be hard to see how any international organization could ever exist in the first place. Thankfully, international relations transcend personal animosities.

From Salon: "I want to vote for Ted Turner for president ... of the world. Turner gave a speech at the World Trade Organization's Public Forum this morning in Geneva that is equal parts inspiring and enlightening, and cuts right to the core of what this blog cares about. It is, in short, a program for making the world work."

"In an effort to further thwart terrorist plots to blow up airliners, the United Nations aviation agency will this week move ahead on producing a new list of prohibited items that passengers cannot bring on board, such as liquid, gel and aerosol products capable of being used in improvised explosive devices.

On 27 and 28 September, the International Explosives Technical Commission of the UN International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO ) will take up the work of a panel that met earlier this month following the thwarted terrorist plot in August in the United Kingdom to blow up some 10 trans-Atlantic flights." More

"Two gunmen on a motorbike killed the provincial director of Afghanistan's Ministry of Women's Affairs outside her home Monday in apparent retribution for her efforts to help educate women, officials said.

Safia Ahmed-jan was slain outside the front gate of her home in this southern Afghan city as she was walking to her office, said Tawfiq ul-Ulhakim Parant, senior adviser to the women's ministry in Kabul.

Aleem Sidique, spokesman for the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, said the U.N. was "appalled at this senseless murder."

"What we need to see in Afghanistan is peace, development and progress," Sidique said. "We share the sentiment of the majority of Afghan people who are appalled at this killing." More

Reuters: "Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, under international pressure over wartorn Darfur, said on Sunday his government would impose a travel ban on U.S. officials that would confine them to the capital Khartoum.... Sudan is under heavy international pressure to allow 20,000 U.N. troops into the western region of Darfur to replace 7,000 poorly funded African Union troops tasked with monitoring a shaky ceasefire."

Jane Holl Lute: "Not many people know this, but the United Nations' peacekeeping force represents the world's second largest deployed military operational presence in the world.

In August, the Security Council voted to create three important and large new peacekeeping missions -- in Lebanon, Timor-Leste and Darfur. But these are only the most recent examples of the world's increasing reliance on UN peacekeeping. During my three years as the Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, we have been asked by the Security Council to establish 9 new peacekeeping missions and seen UN forces triple in size.

UN peacekeepers are currently deployed to 18 hotspots around the world, where they act as an impartial presence to help maintain fragile peace agreements and cease-fires." Read more

Earlier this week, Reuters hosted a conversation with United Nations Foundation founder Ted Turner. Highlights from the transcript are below the fold.

As you can see, the straight talking former CNN owner does not mince his words, and is astoundingly funny. See especially his tale of the $1 billion pledge. You'll enjoy.

On the U.N., the cold war, and the demand for global governance

Q: It's interesting that it was nine years yesterday, I believe, in this very city that you announced your intention to pledge $1 billion over ten years to the United Nations. And in doing my research, I came across a wonderful headline, it actually made me smile. It said, "Ted Turner shocks the world with his $1 billion pledge to the U.N." Thinking about it, you probably shocked yourself more than you shocked the world, didn't you? It wasn't like that you spent a lot of time thinking about this.

TT: Not that. But I had thought about trying to do what I could to strengthen the U.N., particularly during those years preceding my pledge where the United States just wasn't paying its dues. And with CNN, I was following the global situation all the time and I absolutely certain we would not have made it through the Cold War without the U.N. We wouldn't have made it. There would have been a war. I mean when Khrushchev at the U.N. took his shoe off and hit the podium, he was so mad! But he got a place to let off steam. If the U.N. hadn't been there, that would have war right then. The Cuban Missile Crisis. We wouldn't be here without it.

We have to have a global governance of some sort. We have to have it. And the U.N.'s not perfect. It structurally needs to be reformed. The Security Council, it just doesn't make sense to have only five countries and the victors of World War Two. I mean Germany and Japan, that was 60 years ago. They're both two of the most peaceful and best run countries in the world. They have a right to be there. India's not represented on the Security Council. No country from the Muslim world and no country from South America is represented. It's not representative. And if we got a Congress or a Senate like that in the United States, where many states like New York had no representation, we wouldn't go along with it either. We'd want to reform it.

The untold history of the United Nations Foundation:

Q: But coming back to the pledge, I mean you said that this was a decision you took over the course of 48 hours.

TT: Right. Maybe 72.

Q: Maybe 72. (Laughter) How did it come about?

TT: Well, I had been awarded the United Nations Association, which is a group that promotes the U.N. here in the United States. I've been given their award for contributions to the U.N. for the year and I was coming up to New York. I came up here a lot. And when I got on the plane I started thinking about my speech because I always plan real far in advance. I had plenty of time anyway. And I said, "Well, what am I going to say at the night of the dinner?" (Laughter) Well, first, I said, "What's the biggest problem that the U.N. has? The biggest problem the U.N. had at that time was they weren't getting paid by their biggest member, the United States, which was about a billion dollars in arrears. And my first idea was, "I'll announce that I will give the U.N. a billion dollars. (Laughter) And pay the U.S. dues, basically to get them current." And hopefully, the U.S., it would embarrass the Congress and from then on they would pay their dues was the thought.

And so I called my office and talked to my lawyer and my top advisors and I said, "I want to announce" -- I don't know what day of the week it was -- "but I want to announce in two days I'm going to the U.N. dinner. I want to announce that I'm giving a billion dollars to the U.N." "Oh, we need months to look at all the tax consequences and blahblahblah." And I said, "Well, you got 48 hours." (Laughter) And I said, "And I want to tell Kofi Annan about it so it doesn't come as a surprise. You have, really, a day and a half."

And so they called me back that evening and they said, "You can't do it." They said, "The U.N. can't take a private donation. It's just only people who give the U.N. money, or member states. They don't have a set-up for it and it's against their rules. You can't give them a billion dollars."

So I said, "Oh, thank you, god." (Laughter) I wasn't that rich then. I was worth about three billion. So it was a third of everything I had. And I was still in my fifties, I think. So that's pretty early to be giving everything away. Warren's giving it all away, or not all, but giving away billions. But he's in his eighties. You know, the closer you come to the end, the less money really, you know, you can't buy youth. That's one of the things you can't buy. A lot of other things you can't buy either.

But at any rate, so I said, "Well, the Lord just didn't want me to give that money to them. I got my billion dollars back." But then I had trouble sleeping. And I didn't feel as good as I had when I was going to give the billion dollars to the U.N. So I thought, "Well, if I can't give the money directly to the U.N., how about starting a foundation that worked parallel to the U.N. where the money could be funneled into U.N. causes?"

And so I called my boys back in Atlanta and I said, "How about if I start a foundation that works with the U.N. and does the same thing but using that structure?" And they thought for a little while. They said, "Give us an hour or so to think about that." And they didn't get much sleep either. And they called back, "We think that'll work."

So I saw Kofi the next day. I called him up and I said, "I'm going to announce tonight that I'm giving you a billion dollars, and through a foundation." And the most amazing thing was getting the name. I thought I'm good at naming things Goodwill Games, CNN, Superstation. I even named a hockey team The Thrashers. They were going to thrash the opposition. So far they've just been thrashed. (Laughter) I haven't been running them either, so they can't hang that one on me. Anyway, so I asked him, I said, "We need a name. The U.N. Foundation. Can we use your name and can we use your trademark?" And he said, "I'll have to go to Security Council and ask them about that." That's a pretty big deal. Like going to Coca-Cola and saying, "Can I use the Coca-Cola trademark?" And I didn't offer any money for it.

But they had to have a lot of trust because what if I had been a wacko? What if we'd had really been wacky instead of getting along with them. We've never had an argument, really, with (Inaudible) I don't think. And that's been nine years. So anyway, that was how it happened and I've never looked back. I never regretted it. I'm so proud that I did that because then the U.S. did pay the dues within the next 12 months. And things took a turn for the better.

On the role of media and nuclear disarmament:

Q: Let's look for the moment at the Islamic world, just briefly. There's another question from one of our readers. This man has a name. So, I'll ask you. His name's Jeff Burns(?). And he says, "You obviously know a lot about mass communications, Mr. Turner. What can the international media, and the American media specifically, do to improve our understanding of the Islamic world, and their understanding of the West?

TT: Well, my covering it honestly and intelligently. And regularly. We need to understand all people that are like us, and that are different than us. We need to have more understanding. That's one of the reasons that I started CNN, and did my best to try and get them to concentrate as much as I could on serious international news, so that people would be better informed. Because if we don't have the right information today, we're doomed. And the human situation, right now, I liken to a baseball game. It's the seventh inning, and we're down by two runs. That's humanity. And our backs are to the wall. And global warming, nuclear weapons, nuclear proliferation, population explosion, environmental degradation that's occurring in virtually every ecosystem all over the world, we're already two billion people live on less than two dollars a day, and one billion live on less than one dollar a day. We've already got a catastrophe on our hands. Without precedent in the history of the world. And if we don't get it straight, just on global warming alone, God forbid a nuclear war springing up, and more and more proliferation, we've got to get rid of all nuclear weapons as quickly as we possibly can. And that's the only way we'll stop proliferation.

"A top United Nations envoy warned on Thursday that the Darfur peace agreement was on the verge of collapse and lambasted the Darfur Ceasefire Commission (CFC), which is responsible for monitoring and implementing the accord.

Jan Pronk, the UN Special Representative to the Secretary-General in Sudan, echoing comments made on Wednesday to the UN Security Council in New York, warned that the 5 May Darfur peace agreement, signed by the Sudanese government and one faction of the rebel Sudan Liberation Army, was floundering." More

With the world focused on First Avenue this week, Secretary General Kofi Annan's recent diplomatic success in the Middle East deserves attention. Diplomacy abhors a vacuum. And in the days following the calamitous month-long war in Israel and Lebanon, the ceasefire between the Israeli Defense Forces and Hezbollah militants looked quite tenuous. Neither side had much confidence that the other would comply with the ceasefire requirements set out in Security Council Resolution 1701, which ostensibly ended the conflict on August 11th. Adding to this uncertainty were key issues that remained unresolved: the composition of the peacekeeping force, the sea and air blockades, and the status of the two Israeli prisoners captured by Hezbollah were all kicked down road for further discussion.

Fragile situations like this require an honest broker to assure both sides that the other will respect its ceasefire obligations. With the historical powerbrokers of the region unwilling or unable to take on this role, Kofi Annan and the United Nations stepped in. Now, the pieces of a lasting cease-fire and eventual peace accord are beginning to fall into place.

In 11 days - from August 28 until last week - Kofi Annan traveled to Belgium, Lebanon, Israel, the Palestinian Territories, Jordan, Syria, Qatar, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey and Spain for the principal purpose of shoring up support for Resolution 1701. The resolution authorized a large peacekeeping force to augment the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL). But as always with peacekeeping missions, the great hurdle is securing enough troops from the right countries. After a brief initial delay, France and Italy stepped up to contribute a significant number of troops, satisfying one of Israel's early requests that the peacekeepers come from countries with sophisticated military capacities. Still, in the interest of balance, local sensitivities, and to avoid the appearance that UNIFIL would be an occupying force, the Western peacekeepers would have to be complimented by soldiers from Muslim countries as well.

Though many Muslim countries, such as Bangladesh, have historically contributed large numbers of their soldiers to peacekeeping operations around the world, Israel, quite reasonably, requested that only soldiers from countries with which it has diplomatic ties contribute to UNIFIL. This left precious few Muslim countries from which to draw troops. Among this small club, Turkey is the prize. During his stop in Ankara, Annan was able to convince Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to contribute to the force, despite objections from some members of parliament. And following Annan's trip to Jerusalem, the Israeli government softened its position and consented to Indonesian contributions to UNIFIL. In less than a month following the cease-fire, UNIFIL is shaping up to be a Muslim-European peacekeeping force, which was the United Nations' aim from the outset.

Parallel to securing the right troops for Lebanon, Annan shuttled from country to country in order to help create the conditions whereby Israel could lift its sea and air blockade of Lebanon. This was an uphill battle from the get-go, for Israel had insisted that it would lift the blockades only when all of the conditions set forth on resolution 1701 were met. But some of these conditions, such as a border patrol and weapons interdiction regime, were weeks away from being implemented. (When Annan visited Beirut, the German ships scheduled to replace the Israeli Navy off the coast of Lebanon were at least two weeks away from their destination.) Meanwhile, the ongoing blockade was enacting a heavy political toll on Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora as well as impeding reconstruction efforts throughout the country. A frustrated Siniora, reported the Financial Times was reaching the limits of his patience and refused to take Annan's calls.

A day before he was scheduled to head back to New York, Annan made one final push to lift the blockade. Working the phones, he secured an agreement from France to patrol the Lebanese coast until the German navy arrived. Then, asked Germany to send border control agents to Lebanese airports, per Israel's demands. Finally, the conditions were right lifting the blockades. With a call to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Annan was able to convince Israeli Prime Minister Olmert to stand down his forces.

To be sure, there are still issues left to be resolved. Chief among them is securing the release of the two Israeli soldiers kidnapped at the outset of the conflict. To that end, the Secretary General has appointed a secret negotiating team to mediate between the two sides. Without the use of the Secretary General's good offices, it's unclear how - if at all - the two sides could negotiate for the soldiers' release.

It is becoming apparent that Kofi Annan is probably the only person, and the United Nations the only platform, with enough credibility left in the Middle East to do the back room and shuttle diplomacy that was required to bring about a settlement to this summer's month-long war. If this success holds, Kofi Annan may well have permanently established the United Nations as the leading broker of the broader Arab-Israeli conflict.

Early returns show that this could bode well for prospects of peace in the region.

CNN: "Violence killed nearly 6,600 Iraqi civilians during July and August, while more than 8,000 were wounded, according to a report released Wednesday by the U.N. Assistance Mission in Iraq.

More than 20,600 Iraqi civilians have died in attacks so far this year, according to UNAMI. The carnage included a string of execution-style slayings, mortar and rocket attacks as well as suicide bombings apparently targeting civilians."

"Countries will only overcome the "three great challenges" of development, security and human rights if they take action together, globally and coordinated through the United Nations, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday in a wide-ranging speech to world leaders gathered for the opening of the General Assembly's annual debate.

In his final address to the Assembly's general debate before he completes his term at the end of this year, Mr. Annan said the events of the past decade "have not resolved, but sharpened" the challenges of "an unjust world economy, world disorder, and widespread contempt for human rights and the rule of law."

Timothy Wirth, President of the United Nations Foundation, speaks to Jim Lehrer. AUDIO & TRANSCRIPT

"Iraq is in danger of sliding into civil war and its government and the international community must do more to pull it back from the brink, United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said.

"The everyday life of Iraqi people is dominated by the constant threat of sectarian violence and civil strife," Annan said yesterday, addressing a meeting at UN headquarters in New York attended by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani." More

Writing in the Los Angeles Times on Sunday, Jonah Goldberg gnashes his teeth over the apparent failure of United States Ambassador to the UN John Bolton to win Senate confirmation. And in the process of praising Ambassador Bolton, the conservative columnist goes out of his way to trash the UN and simply make things up about Kofi Annan.

Goldberg trots out the tired, and repeatedly disproven, claim that "most Americans think the UN is the problem." Polls consistently show otherwise: Americans overwhelmingly favor multilateral engagement with other countries through the United Nations. This poll by the Mark Mellman group shows that 60% of respondents preferred to "work through the U.N. because such efforts will be seen as more legitimate and allow us to share the costs and risks for ensuring peace and security."

Goldberg also credits Ambassador Bolton for scuttling "Kofi Annan's attempts to ban weapons in space and to, in effect, tax wealthy nations through a wealth transfer scheme that ignores U.N. inefficiency and corruption." Regarding the first charge, I assume that Goldberg is referring to the non-binding resolution on Preventing an Arms Race in Outer Space, which was generated by the General Assembly (not Annan) and was voted against by the United States. As for the second charge that Kofi Annan has some sort of scheme in place to redistribute wealth among nations, I have simply no idea what he is talking about. I sort of assume he is just making that up, perhaps for the sake of the black helicopter crowd. However, if by a "wealth transfer scheme," Goldberg is referring to the way in which United Nations dues have always been assessed then he is sorely missing the point. The U.S. pays 22% of a nearly $4 billion operating budget. In the large scheme of things, that is not a tremendous outlay for the United States government. But the return on that investment-- having a United Nations--is huge. Without America's financial contribution to the United Nations, the lights would shut off and essential programs would dry up.

Finally, Goldberg praises Ambassador Bolton for standing up "on principal" against the new Human Rights Council. But Goldberg fails to point out that Bolton's main objection to the council was centered around a rather fine detail. Bolton's position was that the members of the council should be elected by a 2/3rds majority. The resolution stipulated that new members to the council would be elected by an absolute majority (that's at least 96 countries.) In the end this made little difference; had the 2/3rds criteria been applied, only Sri Lanka, Saudi Arabia, the Czech Republic and Poland would have been kept off the Council.

Obviously, this column by an avowed conservative panders to a certain crowd that is intrinsically hostile to the United Nations. I just wish he would stick to the facts. There is plenty of room for a healthy debate about the role of the United Nations in American foreign policy without having to simply make things up.

NYT: "World leaders gathering for their annual meeting this week will find a new buzz: The United Nations is back in the global spotlight after securing a cease-fire in Lebanon, trying to revive the Middle East peace process and pressing Sudan to allow U.N. peacekeepers into conflict-wracked Darfur."

"China will increase its peacekeeping presence in Lebanon to 1,000 troops, Premier Wen Jiabao has confirmed. The move would make China one of the largest contributors to a strengthened UN force designed to keep the peace." More

"The latest scientific assessments conducted under the auspices of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) found clear evidence of a reduction in ozone-depleting substances in the lower atmosphere, as well as indications that their destructive impact in the stratosphere was also on the wane, according to the message. But they also push back the estimated date for total ozone layer recovery by 15 years, to 2065." More

BBC: "Protesters demanding an end to conflict in Sudan's Darfur region are staging a day of demonstrations around the world.... Seven thousand African Union peacekeeping troops are due to leave Darfur at the end of August, but Khartoum has refused to allow UN peacekeepers to take their place.

The government has stressed that any UN troops entering Darfur would be met with armed resistance. On Saturday 1,000 volunteers from a pro-government militia marched through the streets of Khartoum threatening to kill any uninvited UN visitors, the BBC's Jonah Fisher reports from the city.

Violence in the region is reported to be rising again, drawing criticism from figures as diverse as the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, and actor George Clooney, who this week implored the UN Security Council to act.

George Clooney says the UN is the only place that can address the crisis in Darfur.

"Sectarian violence and insurgent attacks increased throughout Iraq over the past three months, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said in the most negative report an American envoy has given to the Security Council since the 2003 invasion.

"The insurgency remains potent and viable, although its visibility has been overshadowed by the increase in sectarian violence," U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said in the latest quarterly report to the council. "The average number of weekly attacks increased 15 percent over the previous reporting period, and Iraqi casualties increased by 51 percent." More

Washington Post: "U.N. inspectors investigating Iran's nuclear program angrily complained to the Bush administration and to a Republican congressman yesterday about a recent House committee report on Iran's capabilities, calling parts of the document "outrageous and dishonest" and offering evidence to refute its central claims."

"U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has said leaders of Middle Eastern nations believe the Iraq war has "been a real disaster" for the region.

His comments to reporters on Wednesday came after a two-week trip through the Middle East and on a day when separate bomb attacks killed at least 22 people in Baghdad.

"Honestly, most of the leaders I spoke to felt the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath has been a real disaster for them," Annan said. "They believe it has destabilized the region." More

Amidst reports of growing political and security uncertainties in Iraq, the United Nations is still tending to the crucial and monumental task of bringing international donors to the table. Part of that effort includes the International Compact for Iraq, initiated by the UN at the request of the U.S. and Iraqi governments to spur political, economic, and social development.

On Monday, Reuters reported that the Compact appears to be charging ahead with full steam. Over the weekend, representatives from the United Nations, Iraq, Europe, Japan, Korea, and the Middle East met in Abu Dhabi to pledge forward movement on the initiative, continue to iron out details in the framework for delivering aid, and prepare for high-level meetings next week in New York and Singapore.

The fact that representatives were forced to meet in Abu Dhabi, hundreds of miles from Iraq, was proof enough of how desperately a new, multi-lateral strategy is needed. According to the International Herald Tribune, the meeting was held where it was "because Iraq was too unsafe." As the Secretary-General pointed out in a report to the Security Council on Sunday, "The Iraqi people and their leaders have arrived at an important crossroads: if they are able to build firm foundations for the common interest of all Iraqis, the promise of peace and prosperity will be within reach. However, if current patterns of discord and violence prevail for much longer, there is a grave danger of a breakdown of the Iraqi State, and potentially of civil war, which would be detrimental not only to the Iraqi people, but also to countries in the region and the international community in general."

The other members of the Compact, including the U.S. and the Iraqi government, rightly agree that international cooperation and a firm commitment to development are the best hope for putting Iraq on the right track. In fact, the International Herald Tribune reported that Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh said that this "international backing was critical for nothing short of the survival of the Iraqi state."

Under the terms of the Compact, Iraq will make a commitment to meeting the basic needs and protecting the rights of all its citizens; ensuring the optimal use of the country's resources for the common good; treating all the country's ethnic groups fairly and equally; sharing its oil resources through a transparent energy sector; fighting corruption; and adhering to rigorous budgets. In return, the UN has made a commitment to support and facilitate the Compact by bringing together the international donor community and multilateral organizations to help in reconstruction and make Iraq economically self-sufficient within five-years.

"George Clooney takes his plea to stop the genocide in Darfur to the United Nations Security Council on Thursday. The actor, who visited Darfur in April with his father, Nick, will address the U.N. in a briefing organized by the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity. Clooney and Wiesel will hold a press conference Thursday afternoon after the briefing." More

"With last week's lifting of the Israeli air and sea blockade of Lebanon, the United Nations said today that air and sea traffic had begun returning to levels seen before the month-long conflict, while the UN food agency announced it would conduct a survey this month to assess reconstruction needs.

"The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that, since the lifting of the Israeli blockade, air traffic is quickly resuming to pre-conflict levels [and] the lifting of the sea blockade has allowed commercial vessels to return as well," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters in New York." More

Last Friday, after more than a year of tense negotiations, the United Nations General Assembly formally adopted a Global Counter Terrorism Strategy. The strategy is as ambitious as it sounds, and the fact that it passed at all is a huge accomplishment.

For the better part of the year, it seemed that the Assembly would not be able to generate this kind of document as there were deep divisions among member states over how to classify terrorism and terrorist acts. But in the end, it was another feather in the cap for General Assembly President Jan Elliason who oversaw the unanimous passage of the resolution.

To be sure, the plan includes the kind of generalized language that one would expect to find when 192 countries must seek common ground on a contentious issue. Nevertheless, individual features of the plan could yield some important breakthroughs. For example, it details measures to build states' capacity to prevent and combat terrorism, such as lending international support to less developed countries to implement measures to combat money laundering and terrorist financing. It also calls for the U.N. to play a greater operational role in the struggle against terrorism by, among other things, creating a database of "biological incidents" that is complementary those of Interpol.

In all, the document spells out concrete steps that member states could take to collectively engage the struggle against international terrorism. It's a fitting job for the world body.

"Marking five years since the September 11 attacks on the United States, Secretary-General Kofi Annan today said they were directed against "humanity itself," as he urged all Member States to honour the victims of terrorism everywhere by implementing a new strategy that the world body adopted last week to fight the global scourge.

"The attacks of 11 September 2001 cut us all to the core, for they were an attack on humanity itself. Today, our thoughts and prayers are with the victims, and with all those who lost loved ones in the tragedy ... And we remember all those who have fallen victim to other acts of terrorism around the world," Mr. Annan said in a statement." More

"Sudan insisted yesterday that there would be no security vacuum if African peacekeepers leave Darfur next month.

Kofi Annan, the United Nations secretary-general, warned on Friday that Sudan's leaders could be held responsible for atrocities in the troubled western region if the African Union force is forced to pull out and Khartoum refuses to allow their replacement by UN troops." More

Writing in The New Republic, Tim Fenholz asks whether Security Council Resolution 1706 is enough to stop the genocide in Darfur. The short answer is "no," but not because the resolution is feckless -- it is actually quite ambitious and calls for a robust peacekeeping force for Darfur. Rather, the U.S.- U.K. sponsored resolution is failing Darfur because it is currently in a holding pattern while the Security Council awaits Khartoum's consent.

Given Khartoum's intransigence, Fenholz concludes, "Only a Western-led intervention force--whether under the auspices of NATO, the United Nations, or some coalition of willing countries--can put a stop to the genocide." That may be true, but a Western-led intervention is not coming anytime soon. Even in the midst of a bloody new offensive in Darfur, there is little to suggest that the Western powers of which Fernholz speaks have the will to intervene outside United Nations auspices. This leaves the United Nations route--which requires Khartoum's consent to a peacekeeping force--as the last reasonable chance for Darfur.

Morally, securing Khartoum's consent should not be a factor upon which the international community decides to intervene in Darfur. Neither is Khartoum's consent a legal requirement before peacekeepers can deploy to the region.

Rather, Khartoum's acquiescence to a peacekeeping force in Darfur is mandatory for basic logistic reasons. The 17,000 troops called for in the resolution would somehow need to get to landlocked Darfur; the United Nations cannot parachute them to Darfur guns-a-blazing. Peacekeepers are not Marines. They can be well trained, highly professional soldiers, but they are not war fighters. Further, when troops arrive in Darfur, they would need to be supported with constant shipments of fuel, food, and equipment. For this, the United Nations would need access to Sudanese ports and airfields.

Securing Khartoum's permission may not feel right, but it's the only hope for Darfur at this point.

"A Senate panel postponed a vote scheduled for Thursday on approving John Bolton as U.N. ambassador, a job he has held temporarily since last year when President Bush appointed him over Democratic opposition.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Richard Lugar, R-Ind., gave no reason for the delay and did not say when the vote would be held. Bolton had been opposed by many Democrats but was expected to be confirmed by the Republican-led panel." More

For years, American foreign policy strategists have articulated the importance of constructively engaging our allies around the world. According to a fascinating new study, this could be good politics as well.

In The Hill, pollster Mark Mellman reveals details of a new survey which shows that Americans, by a wide margin, prefer multilateral approaches to the most daunting foreign policy challenges facing the United States.

The numbers are striking. According to Mellman, only 31% of those surveyed share a commitment to unilateralism, whereas "nearly twice as many (60%) prefer to 'work through the U.N...'" The same internationalist impulses run deep when it comes to confronting terrorism. Says Mellman, "just 25% accept ... the view that it is more important 'for the U.S. to decide on its own whether and how to hit terrorists and the countries that support them.' Sixty-eight percent put the priority on having other nations 'respect us and want to work with us in the war on terror.'" (emphasis mine)

Mellman's survey is one of many studies over the years which have consistently shown that a preference for isolationism or unilateralism commonly associated with the American populace is more myth than reality. Further, Mellman confirms what internationalist foreign policy advocates have been saying for years: a constructive, engaging foreign policy that earns the United States respect in the world is good politics as well.

"With armed conflicts raging around the world, prevention is too important to be left in the hands of governments alone, senior United Nations officials told the press in New York today on the eve of a General Assembly debate on Secretary-General Kofi Annan's recent report on the issue.

Issued five years after his first comprehensive report on the prevention of armed conflict, this 54-page document responds to resolutions of the General Assembly and the Security Council. Mr. Annan notes that "a culture of prevention is indeed beginning to take hold at the United Nations," but adds that "an unacceptable gap remains between rhetoric and reality in the area of conflict prevention." More

UNHCR spokesperson Ron Redmond: "With UNHCR's distribution of emergency aid proceeding smoothly, our field teams are now looking at some of the wider problems facing the victims of the war in Lebanon. There are thousands of Lebanese who have not been able to return to their homes - in areas around Beirut there are an estimated 12,000 displaced who have not returned after the war. In Beirut itself, the charity Caritas estimates there are 35,000. These people have lost their source of income. Older people and those with disabilities have chronic medical needs.

And our partners note that the children need help to resume their education and counselling because of their war experiences. As part of that problem, UNHCR has helped a Lebanese NGO, the Development for People and Nature Association, to set up a summer camp they're running for children in the town of Jezzine." More

Khartoum has dug itself deeper into opposition of Security Council Resolution 1706, which calls for a robust United Nations peacekeepers force to replace the African Union force in Darfur. So desperate is Khartoum to prevent the implementation of 1706, they have issued an ultimatum to the African Union: block the United Nations from taking over the mission in Darfur, or face expulsion on September 30th, when their mandate runs out. Meanwhile, a clearly emboldened Khartoum has launched a major military offensive in Darfur, in clear violation of May's Darfur Peace Agreement.

From Egypt, Kofi Annan harshly criticized Khartoum's recent actions.

"The international community has been feeding about 3 million people in camps and if we have to leave because of lack of security, lack of access to the people then what happens? The government will have to assume responsibility for doing this and if it doesn't succeed, it will have lots of questions to answer before the rest of the world," he said

It's clear that the safety of three million Darfuris in refugee camps is not top on the minds of those who orchestrated the genocide in Darfur. Key member states (including Security Council members that abstained from resolution 1706) must demand that the regime halts its offensive and acquiesce to the peacekeeping force detailed in 1706. However, the clock is ticking. In weeks, not months, three million people could begin to starve to death in forlorn IDP camps in western Sudan should Khartoum's intransigence continue.

NYT: "Secretary General Kofi Annan said Monday that the United Nations would mediate talks on the release of Israeli and Hezbollah prisoners.... Mr. Annan said the talks would be conducted discreetly, with the goal of setting up the "mechanism" to effect the release of prisoners from both sides, which he said he hoped would be the first step in more thorough-going talks involving Israel and Lebanon. He also said he would insist on control of the negotiation and no interference from outside."

"The Sudanese government has dramatically intensified the war in Darfur in a bid to finish off the tenacious, three-year-old rebellion before a U.N. peacekeeping force can deploy there, say analysts, rebels and officials from the African Union monitoring mission.... The U.N. Security Council last week approved a peacekeeping force of up to 22,500 that would take the place of the African Union troops, but Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir has sought to block it from being deployed." More

IHT: "Afghanistan's opium harvest this year has reached the highest levels ever recorded, showing an increase of almost 50 percent from last year, the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Antonio Maria Costa, said in Kabul."

"The United Nations strongly condemned the slaying of an international Red Cross driver in Darfur and demanded factions in the war-torn Sudanese region protect humanitarian workers." More

Also: New round of fighting is feared in Darfur - UN votes to send peacekeepers