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Hvad vi kan forvente af 2011
En amerikansk kongres med Republikansk flertal, der allerede signalerer nedskæringer i budgetterne til FN-programmer; spændinger i Sikkerhedsrådet, som magter som Indien, Sydafrika og Tyskland påbegynder deres medlemsskab; spørgsmålet om Sudan - for ikke at nævne spørgsmålet om et selvstændigt Palæstina; Hariri-tribunalet i Libanon; og hvorvidt det lykkes at få diplomatiske forhandlinger i gang mellem Nord- og Syd Korea.
Dét er blot nogle få af de udfordringer, der venter for diplomater og ngo'er i FN's gange i 2011, i følge Colum Lynch' analyse i bloggen fra og om 'Turtle Bay'
The difficult year ahead at Turtle Bay
The year 2010 got off to an awful beginning for the United
Nations, with the breakdown in climate talks at Copenhagen shaking
confidence in multilateral diplomacy, and a devastating earthquake
in Haiti that wiped out the country's leadership and decimated the
U.N. mission there. 2011 seems like it will be equally difficult,
as the assembled diplomats of Turtle Bay prepare to struggle with
disputed elections, intransigent member states, and multiple
nuclear crises. Here's a less-than-cheerful New Year's guide to
some of the biggest challenges on the U.N.'s horizon.
The return of Congressional oversight
For two years, the U.N. has been the beneficiary of a policy of
benign neglect on Washington's Capitol Hill, where a Democratic
Congress has pretty much left it to the Obama administration to
chart its own course at Turtle Bay. Those days are coming
to a swift end. An emboldened Republican majority, led by the new
chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee, Ileanna Ros
Lehtinen (R-FL), has already signaled an interest in reviewing U.S.
financial support for U.N. programs, citing the need for belt
tightening. A Cuban-American lawmaker from a heavily Jewish
district, Ros Lehtinen can also be expected to use her position to
shore up Israel's conservative prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu,
and to ratchet up pressure on Iran, and the Palestinian Authority.
In February, 2009, she introduced legislation to cut U.S.
funding for the United Nations and the U.N. Relief and Works
Agency, which is responsible for providing relief to more than 4
million Palestinian refugees throughout the Middle East. Lehtinen's
intransigence could complicate the Obama administration's efforts
to ensure funding for new and enlarged U.N.-backed peacekeeping
missions in Somalia and Ivory Coast.
Ban Ki-moon II
U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told reporters at his
year-end press conference that he will soon definitively announce
whether he will be running for a second five-year term in 2011, but
he's already been hinting for months that he wants to remain in the
job through 2016. Ban's tenure has been a disappointment to many
key pro-U.N. constituencies, including human rights groups,
progressive intellectuals, and conflict resolution organizations.
The New York Times editorial page scolded Ban for failing
to raise concerns about China's human rights performance during a
meeting with Chinese leader Hu Jintao, and counseled Washington to
rethink its plans to back Ban for a second term. But Ban has
managed to maintain sufficient support from key U.N. member states,
particularly the powerful permanent five members of the Security
Council -- the United States, China, Russia, France, Britain -- to
ensure smooth sailing for a second term. Some of the criticism has
been dismissed by Asian governments, principally China and South
Korea, as biased towards the organizations first Asian leader since
the 1970s. A top Indian official, meanwhile, said that New Delhi
would support a second term for Ban. That has dissuaded contenders
from throwing their hat into the ring. Shashi Tharoor, an Indian
novelist, politician, and former U.N. official who ran second to
Ban in his 2006 bid for secretary general, was asked whether he had
plans to consider a second run. "None whatsoever," he wrote on his
Twitter account @ShashiTharoor. "That train has
left the station."
Rising tension in the Security Council
The U.S. will confront the toughest, most powerful, assemblage
of world powers in the U.N. Security Council in 2011 with India,
South Africa, and Germany beginning two-year terms that they hope
will lead to permanent membership on the council. (Brazil will
start its second year on the council). The new composition will
reinforce the council's voting bloc that emphasizes sovereignty
issues and is led by China and Russia. That will make it more
difficult for the U.S. and European powers to use the U.N.'s prime
security to enforce human rights or to weigh in on disputed
national elections, as they did last month in Ivory Coast. The
council is also likely to see more protracted negotiations on most
issues -- from North Korean aggression, to the Iranian nuclear
program -- as the newly emerging middle powers demand a greater say
in managing the major crises of the day. On the upside, the trend
may give Security Council agreements greater international
legitimacy and credibility, making it more difficult for countries
to ignore its edicts. In that vein, the Wall Street Journal
reported a story Wednesday claiming
India, Iran's largest trading partner, has begun to more rigorously
enforce sanctions against Tehran.
Working for a peaceful partition of Sudan
There is one achievement within reach next year that could
easily burnish the reputation of the U.N., and renew faith in
multilateral conflict resolution: the management of a bloodless
transition to independence in South Sudan, which is scheduled to
vote January 9 on the partition of Africa's largest country. In an
effort to avert a return to civil war, the Obama administration has
committed high-level diplomatic attention to the transition,
participating in negotiations with the two sides over the future of
the country. But sharp differences remain. Khartoum and South Sudan
have yet to reach agreement on a broad range of vital issues,
including citizenship in the divided Sudan, grazing rights, and
control over water, oil, and other natural resources. "The
referendum is sure to shock Sudan's political system," says the
International Crisis
Group. "The absence of a basic blueprint for the
post-2011 relationship between North and South contributes to
uncertainties about the political and economic future of each,
risks the referendum being viewed as a zero-sum game and thus
sustains fears about the smooth conduct of the exercise and
acceptance of its result."
Getting tough in Ivory Coast
This West African country has been below the radar screen
throughout much of Ban's tenure, but it has exploded into a major
crisis since the country's long time ruler, Laurent Gbagbo, and its
opposition leader, Alassane Ouattara, both claimed victory in the
country's November 28 national election. Ivory Coast electoral
commission declared Ouattara the winner, but the Constitutional
Council, headed by a Gbagbo ally, rejected the judgment, and Gbagbo
has had himself sworn in as president. With Russia threatening to
block the U.N.'s intervention, the Security Council did nothing at
first, even as violence erupted in Ivory Coast. But the U.S,
the U.N., and West African governments have since moved to
recognize Ouattara, and have stripped Gbagbo's representative to
the U.N. of his diplomatic credentials. U.N. peacekeepers
will continue to provide a last line of defense for Ouattara, who
has hunkered down in a hotel in the capital city, but no one yet
knows what combination of diplomacy of violence will resolve the
crisis.
The republic of Palestine
With Middle East peace talks at an impasse, the Palestinian
authority has signaled once again that it may mount a push at the
United Nations to recognize the state of Palestine. The
Palestinian authority has proposed a similar action various times
in the past, but it has never followed through. This time, however,
the Palestinians have already persuaded Brazil, which is serving in
the Security Council, Argentina and Bolivia to back a Palestinian
independence drive. Any push for a Security Council resolution
recognizing the Palestinians would likely provoke a U.S. veto. But
the U.N. General Assembly could take it up, providing a stage for
the Palestinians to rally international opinion against Netanyahu's
government.
The Lebanon tribunal
The U.N. probe into the 2005 Valentine Day's assassination of
former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri is set to release
indictments against suspects this year, and numerous reports
suggest that Hezbollah agents will be named. The charges are
expected to roil politics in Lebanon, where thousands of U.N.
peacekeepers are struggling to maintain a 2006 ceasefire between
Israel and Hezbollah.
Ban's man in Pyongyang
Prospects for a diplomatic breakthrough on the nuclear crisis on
the Korean peninsula have looked particularly grim in 2010 as North
Korea, undergoing a fragile dynastic succession, has lashed out at
South Korea, torpedoing the South Korean war ship, Cheonan, killing
46 sailors, and shelling the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong,
killing two marines and two civilians. But South Korean President
Lee Myung-bak raised the prospect for a diplomatic resolution, saying he would support a
resumption of stalled six-nation diplomatic talks aimed at
shuttering Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program. Top American
officials told the Washington Post and the New York
Times this month that China has exerted pressure on North
Korea to show restraint after South Korea pressed ahead with plans
for military training exercise near Yeonpyeong. It appears unlikely
for the moment that the U.N. Security Council will play a major
role in managing the crisis. China has largely blocked efforts by
South Korea to seek a Security Council condemnation of North
Korea's attacks. Ban Ki moon, who strained to carve out a mediation
role, got a boost last month when Russia introduced a proposal to
have Ban send an envoy to the region to mediate the dispute. Susan
E. Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said Washington
was open to the U.N. assuming such a role. But that initiative
seems to be on hold for the moment.
Kilde: http://turtlebay.foreignpolicy.com/
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UN Photo/Michos Tzovaras

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