“The new millennium presents the most appropriate time to review the history of United Nations(UN) institution, its successes and failures, and expectations for its future.” Opinions may differ about the successes and failure of the United Nations as an instrument for world peace and security. But everyone will agree that it has played a crucial role in the economic and social advancement of the people. United Nation’s efforts in the early Cold War era concentrated on the relationships between nations and the issues of war and peace. The UN has confronted with the challenges arising from global interdependence and social and economic inequalities. These new realities served to broaden the scope of UN activities and chart the future course of its global involvements. With the end of the Cold War, international concerns expanded to include the increasing economic competition between developed countries, problems of development, environmental degradation, population growth, and the threat of nuclear proliferation, the violation of human rights, and political fragmentation or civil wars within national boundaries. It is the UN that is called upon to confront these new challenges and to develop solutions. Some, concerned with a potential loss of national autonomy, prefer unilateral to multilateral action. But, because of its mandated principles, many believe that the UN is the only actor capable of tackling such daunting problems, although they are aware of the UN’s inadequacies in putting its principles into action. Thus in the above framework, what should be the role of the United Nations in this new global order? How must the UN be reformed to confront its new challenges? What support should the United States provide for the UN, an institution where it holds significant power? and what lessons have we learned, as an international community, to guide the UN into our future? These are the questions we seek to answer through discussions and debates with United Nations. The focus of the discussions and debates with United Nations are hope that we have for the future, peace, prosperity and a fairer more just world. It was these hopes, which led to the establishment of the United Nations following the Second War to devastate the world in the first half of the twentieth century. Today, we also discuss the topic of hope amidst the despair of the death and destruction due to a COVID-19 pandemic and the questioning of the relevance of the UN.
The Iraq war represents the failure to resolve an international problem through multilateral channels. For the critics of the United Nations, it represents a failure of that organization. In fact, the UN has been buried many times by critics, but it has survived. It has survived because there would does need a multilateral forum and a framework of international rules to create an order and assist security. Whatever difficulty the UN has in trying to manage divided international opinion over the use of force against Iraq, it is the belief that the UN will be found once more to be essential in managing the post-conflict situation in Iraq. It will be essential firstly in addressing Iraq’s humanitarian needs. While the UN may have been side-lined by countries opting for unilateral action against Iraq, it is somewhat ironic that it may be called upon to pick up the pieces after the conflict. A range of UN agencies – the World Food Programme, UNICEF, the UN High Commission for Refugees and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) needs to spring into action to alleviate hardship and suffering of the civilian population. Those challenging the relevance of the UN, also, of course, ignore the critical role it plays in wider areas of development, human rights, refugees and the environment.
The United Nations have involved in Afghanistan for more than fifty years. It works through its agencies like United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), and many more agencies. Besides it, it also has been functioning with international community/organizations. The United Nations took much more interest in peacekeeping process in the 1990s. In this time, the Taliban came to power in Afghanistan after the civil war. The Taliban and Al Qaeda are famous in Afghanistan for threatening its development and reconstruction process for peacebuilding. In the Cold War era, America was funding these terrorist groups for countering the Soviet army. After the withdrawal of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics(USSR), the capital was reduced by the U.S. for these terrorist groups. They were not getting any financial support from outside countries. In 2001, the terrorist attacked in the United States. This attack made a threat to Western nations. These countries came to close and supported by any means of sources in America. In 2001, the America attacked Afghanistan for combating insurgency groups. It was support for removing the Taliban from power. After the fall of the Taliban in 2001, the global associations/group attempted the monstrous endeavours to help the Afghan Government in recreating, advancement, peacebuilding and the social improvement circumstance. The United States started many programs in Afghanistan in which the UNAMA and UNDP play a vital role in these fields of reconstruction, development, and peacebuilding. The UNDP provided a channel and secured transparent financial and management oversight for funds from a range of donors to the fragile country because their institutions are weak and insufficient management capacity. The UNDP has been dynamic in the majority of the key fields identified with the usage of the Bonn Agreement understanding. It ultimately upheld the more great United Nation Security Council command. The extensive recuperation and recreation exertion in Afghanistan are enormous and muddled. It’s due to a joint effort with the Afghan government includes U.N. offices, reciprocal contributors, universal associations, and neighbourhood and worldwide non-legislative associations(NGOs). The related guide projects in the United States and its European partners concentrate on an expansive scope of exercises, from fortifying the focal and nearby administrations of Afghanistan and its security strengths to advancing non military personnel reproduction, diminishing corruption, and helping with decisions. The scope and geographic achieve the UNDP’s program in Afghanistan severely constrained by security concerns. The approach of UNDP had all the earmarks of constructing less in light of an orderly examination of the contention and a technique tending to the necessary components of long haul peacebuilding, and to a greater extent, an administration introduction drove by the requests of the global group and later, the between time Afghan approves. Be that as it may, UNDP has given broad support to the UNAMA in the significant zones of state building. The United Nations accomplish through the international community in Afghanistan for reconstructing peace-building process has have little success in achieving sustainable peace.
The Responsibility to Protect (R2P), the global commitment adopted at the 2005 United Nations World Summit had been central to the international discourse on how to respond to mass atrocity crimes in Syria. Despite the acrimonious debate surrounding the UN Security Council-mandated intervention in Libya in 2011, individual states, regional organizations and UN agencies have struggled to find ways and means of upholding their responsibility to protect the people of Syria. Public censure of atrocities committed by both government forces and armed opposition groups, as well as bilateral sanctions, investigations by the UN Human Rights Council and a Joint Monitoring Mission deployed during the failed 2012 ceasefire, stand as examples of international efforts to confront atrocities in Syria. But it has not been enough. The Responsibility to Protect is an international norm, but it does not possess independent agency. The failure to end atrocities and protect civilians in Syria is not a failure of R2P, but of the imperfect actors and institutions charged of the Syrian government to stop killing its own people. As since responsibility rests with the one body entrusted and mandated by the 193 members of the United Nations with the maintenance of international peace and security – the United Nations Security Council. Despite resolutions that led to the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile and improved access to the 12.2 million suffering Syrian civilians who remain in desperate need of humanitarian assistance, political divisions and partisan interests within the Security Council have been an insurmountable obstacle. In particular, Russia and China had on four separate occasions employed their vetoes to block action in response to mass atrocity crimes in Syria, including a May 2014 draft resolution that would have referred the Syrian situation to the International Criminal Court. As this paper shows, each veto strengthened impunity and encouraged the expansion of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
No other organization is able to confront the plethora of cross-border challenges: global diseases including HIV/AIDS, avian influenza viruses, swine influenza viruses, canine influenza viruses, equine influenza viruses, etc. Influenza and best known diseases – Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome(SARS), Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS), COVID-19, Mad Cow, malaria and TB – in the past & recent century, climate change, environmental degradation, refugee issues, people smuggling, human right, poverty and hunger. It is how it responds to these cross-border challenges. The UN system continues to the international norms by which every member state should abide. In today’s globalizing world, no member state, no matter how powerful it is, can disengage from multilateralism entirely. The UN remains a relevant organisation and will continue to have a central role to play in the 21st century. Notwithstanding media criticism of the United Nations, what seems to be forgotten is that the organisation is only as strong as the will of its member states. The United Nations system relies on the collective will of all its members. It is these member states that set its priorities. The UN cannot act without their consent. It falls therefore upon us all to make the UN relevant in today’s world. In this regard, the United Nations and its members are very aware of the shortcomings of the organisation. For the UN to meet its potential it needs to reform. It needs to better prioritise its work to meet the needs of member states. This was the essence of the Secretary General’s second term reform initiative, which seeks to strengthen the organisation to better respond to the priorities established in the Millennium Declaration and to meet the needs of Member States. The United Nations is not a perfect organisation, but it remains true that any nation-state can achieve far less in isolation than it can working collectively with other states under UN auspices. The Secretary-General envisaged his role as an intermediary and a person who manages peace institutions and also brought about new techniques to the process of peacekeeping. The UN elucidated what human rights is for the international community. It played an important part in the decolonisation process by giving formal recognitions to the newly independent and formed countries, and also by aiding them in their economic and social development. The UN also played a huge role in the formation of international law. By conducting many international conferences, the UN progressed towards building an international consensus on major global problems such as population, environment, women’s status, development, human rights and such other basic concerns. The UN specialised agencies steered major normative and regulatory arrangements in their respective fields of activities and also gave humanitarian aid in many crisis-riddled parts of the globe. More recently, in spite of many limitations on resources and manpower, the UN has somehow responded to a considerable rise in the demand for peacekeeping forces and other emergency operations in the world. However, in spite of the reasonably good record of the UN, it is the organisation’s drawbacks that receive the highest attention. Many members have remarked about the UN’s disappointing performance but without acknowledging the fact that the organisation can only be as effective as the governments’ allowance of it. No doubt the UN has deficiencies, but it is generally made a scapegoat of the pitfalls of the member states. Today, safeguarding human security in its broadest sense mandates a fresh approach both by the UN and the governments. In the context of enhancing the capacity of the UN to tackle emergencies, there is a need to clarify and rethink its use of military force. Also, the UN response to many problems like resource exhaustion, population explosion, environmental degradation and migration is yet to be completely articulated. Many grave social problems such as women’s position, unemployment of youth, cultural diversity, education and technology impact are being addressed only now. The UN has not as yet been able to deal effectively with such global economic issues as currency instability, indebtedness, protectionism, and inequitable commercial relations. It the Organization is to realize its potential in the world of the twenty-first century. It’s members must recognize and resolve a paradox caused by the altered condition of the world. The association of sovereign states set up seventy five years ago to “save succeeding generations from the scourge of war” is now expected to function as the public service sector of a world community that does not exist as a political entity. In virtually all of its activities, from peacekeeping to development, from human rights to environmental accords, the United Nations is being asked to play a larger role and to assume fresh responsibilities at a time when governments are increasingly anxious to reduce their financial contributions, and increasingly reluctant to provide the necessary political, military and material support. Governments will only give the needed support if they see the United Nations as essential for advancing their interests in an effective and appropriate manner. Grappling with their current concerns, governments can not be expected to invest in totally new formulas of international organization or world government. The Independent Working Group on the Future of the United Nations was convened by the Ford Foundation in late 1993 at the request of former Secretary-General Boutros-Ghali to reassess the role, mission, and function of the United Nations. The Working Group’s Report, The United Nations in Its Second Half – century was presented to the Secretary-General and released to the public in 1995. The working group was chaired by Moeen Qureshi, former Prime Minister of Pakistan, and Richard von Weiszacker, former President of Germany. Throughout these Report, it has been repeatedly stressed the need for the Member States to provide the leadership, common will and purpose which are necessary to create a more effective United Nations as it enters its next fifty years. The future United Nations System Change will not come easily. A great gulf often exists between what is ideal and what is politically possible. For now, the key to progress is to understand the paradox which confronts the UN, and to work more effectively through existing mechanisms or, where further change is necessary, to improve those mechanisms. The UN’s galaxy of organizations must be made to operate as an integrated system within the framework of agreed policies. Its activities, including peacekeeping, development and social programs, must complement each other. Its work has to gain a greater understanding among the private and nongovernmental sectors, the public and the media. These goals are reachable. Indeed, they must be reached soon, if the United Nations is the fulfil the hopes and aspirations of the peoples of the world whom it was set up to serve. What might a successful UN system look like some decades hence, when our children and grandchildren confront these global challenges? Such a vision need not imply a total transformation of today’s world.
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