States must face UN challenges

Justin Frewen Photo/File

As the United Nations approaches the 70th anniversary of its founding in 1945, it is confronted with a range of operational and political challenges. Not the least of these is the credibility of the organisation to act as an independent arbiter in global affairs.

Only 20 years ago, in the early 1990s, as the enmities of the Cold War fizzled out, it appeared as if a new era of international co-operation was about to dawn, one in which the UN was perfectly positioned to play a central role.

The unprecedented international unanimity behind the US-led military action in 1991 to expel Iraqi soldiers from Kuwait, under UN Security Council Resolution 678, seemed to confirm the widespread belief that the divisive political rivalries of the past were now no more than a quaint historical curiosity.

Today, these dreams have been firmly if not irrevocably shattered, as conflicts rage on worldwide. A major casualty of these shattered illusions has been the UN and its reputation as an impartial arbiter among disputing factions.

The first decade of the 21st century was a particularly bad one for the UN as the organisation's credibility took a serious battering. The international furore created by the Volker report on the UN administration of the Iraq sanctions before the 2003 invasion, accusations of corruption against the previous UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's son and allegations of financial impropriety by the head of the Iraqi oil-for-food programme were all sources of significant embarrassment.

UN peacekeepers were alleged to have abused women and young girls as well as engaging in forced prostitution The failure to resolve the dispute among members of the UN Security Council over the invasion of Iraq dealt a substantial blow to the international legal order.

As a result, the UN has become regarded as at best an ineffective body powerless to prevent the more powerful nations from interfering in other countries or, at worst, a willing collaborator in this process.

This perception has led to an increased targeting of the UN and its personnel.

The killing of 22 people and injuring of a further 100 during the assault on the UN office in Baghdad in 2003 removed any idea the organisation might have had regarding the relative immunity of its personnel. The attacks continued through the decade culminating in the assault on a UN guesthouse in Kabul in 2009, which resulted in 12 deaths.

In 2013, 33 UN peacekeepers and 25 civilians and associated personnel were killed, an increase of 21 on the 37 killed the previous year.

So how can the UN address this situation? First one must remember the UN is not an independent entity. Its member states decide what it can and cannot do.

In the case of resolving conflicts or peacekeeping missions, the five permanent members of the Security Council more or less control the decision-making process and have the right to veto any resolution.

Many of the UN's problems can be traced to the failure of the global community, particularly the wealthier nations, to allocate sufficient funds to support its programmes.

Issues such as these must be confronted, not only by the UN but perhaps, more importantly, by its member states, if the organisation is to realise the heady dreams of international peace and co-operation of the early 1990s.

Justin Frewen is a Wanganui-based United Nations consultant, who has served the UN on humanitarian missions for almost 20 years.