UNhappy times?

“We are outgunned. We are outmanned. We need help from outside groups. We need to be able to organize outsiders to work with us to write to papers, to appear on television.”

So said Kofi Annan a few days ago, articulating the frustration of the United

Nations at being pushed to defend itself against various scandals. Right now, the United Nations is synonymous with oil-for-food, sexual abuse by peacekeepers, alleged sexual harassment by highly placed UN personnel, and so on. At the time of the Iraq war, everyone was sure the UN would fold up. The Americans were against it for not supporting the war, and the rest of world for not stopping it. The media is unsympathetic, dominated as it is by the American worldview, and nothing the UN says or does seems to be right.

And so, though Kofi hasn’t asked me, I’d like to do my bit towards building up the image of “the only club in the world which attracts every eligible member” (Shashi Tharoor, Undersecretary General for Communications and Public Information).

At this point, we could ask ourselves two questions – the first is, why bother? The UN doesn’t affect those of us sitting in the subcontinent anyway. The second, more obvious question, is why is the UN being hounded and why is it ineffective in defending itself?

The premise on which the first question is based, is unsound. It is founded on the astoundingly widespread ignorance of how the UN is constituted and how it functions. An example of this is the way Kofi Annan is held responsible for not stopping the Iraq war and the Rwandan genocide. Kofi Annan is a man with a great deal of influence, but no powers - except over the staff of the UN. There was nothing he could do to stop the Iraq war, except talk to George Bush, who didn’t listen to him. And the Security Council didn’t sanction the extra troops needed in Rwanda, so nothing could be done there either. The Secretary-General and his Secretariat, in public perception, are invested with powers they do not possess. And consequently, are blamed for the sins committed by the Security Council.

Beyond politics, the UN touches our daily lives in ways that we do not even think about. For instance, without the UN, we couldn’t watch all the TV channels we do – it is the UN’s International Telecommunications Union (ITU) that manages the entire global system of satellite frequencies and bandwidths, so that different countries don’t broadcast on each other’s frequencies. Similarly, the UN’s Universal Postal Union makes international postage possible by mandating that stamps issued by one country be honoured in another. The International Civil Aviation Organization regulates the functioning of airports and aircraft all over the world; one of its rules making English the common language to be used while flying, by all pilots and air-traffic controllers. Then there are the better-known UNICEF, UNESCO, FAO, ILO, etc. that are all specialized agencies of the UN. These are reason enough for the ordinary citizen of the world to support the existence of the UN.

To address the second question adequately, one must first accept that the UN, like any bureaucratic organization anywhere in the world, is far from perfect. It has its share of misdeeds, wrongdoers, inefficient and corrupt practices and people – which is why everyone agrees that the UN must be reformed, and fast. This is not to say that the UN must not be criticized for its shortcomings – what is surprising is the viciousness of the attacks, especially from the American Govt. and media. The US Govt. is the only one to have instituted its own inquiry into the oil-for-food imbroglio, over and above the UN’s inquiry by Paul Volcker – a move that very clearly says ‘We don’t trust the UN.’ The US Govt. also doesn’t like the UN, as they want UN-hater (‘There is no such thing as the United Nations’) John Bolton to be the next US ambassador to the UN. This same Govt., which loved Kofi Annan, backed his ascension to Secretary-General, gave him full support for seven years, now hates his guts – for saying publicly that he thought the Iraq war was illegal.

But what about the media? What about the precious principles of free speech that supposedly exemplify American democratic values? What about balanced reporting? The problem was explained by Joshua Friedman, ex-UN bureau chief and Pulitzer prize-winning journalist in a recent interview with CNN’s Richard Roth. He said that most reporters in the US get their material on oil-for-food from US Govt. sources. There are very few independent journalistic investigations into the matter, and those that are there, are overwhelmed by reports painting the UN as the sole villain. The UN’s side of the story, for some reason, almost never makes it to the page or screen. Besides, most of the American press very conveniently ignores the oil smuggling that the US military chose not to police, which cost several billion dollars more than oil-for-food.

Unfortunately for the UN, it has become a convenient scapegoat for the xenophobic right-wingers in the US, including the Govt., to blame all their problems on, and divert attention from domestic concerns. The hullabaloo over oil-for-food makes it appear, to the semi-informed US citizen at least, that the money that went into Saddam’s pocket, with active UN connivance, was the American taxpayer’s hard earned dollar. This story suits the US Govt. just fine, as it channels the ordinary American’s outrage towards the UN; which would otherwise have been directed at the Govt. itself, for taking the country to war on the basis of a falsehood.

In an imperfect world, the UN is no different. But a world without the UN is not worth thinking about. The UN needs to clean up its act, and reach out to us, ‘the peoples of the United Nations’. And not worry too much about Georgie and his pals.