United Nations

“The last time the U.S. withheld funds, it led to a huge debt to the U.N. and inhibited our ability to lead within the institution,” Wirth said. “This is like trying to force a bank to renegotiate your home mortgage by refusing to make your monthly payments.”

Timothy Wirth, president of the United Nations Foundation

Uh… no. Witholding funds to the U.N. is more akin to a casino withholding credit to a gambling junkie who can’t win and can’t stop.

I think the people who support the UN can be divided into three broad groups: anti-Americans; people who were taught at a young age that the UN is good and who don’t pay close attention to current affairs; and people for whom support for the UN is a matter of religious faith, not unlike faith in the benefits of recycling or the threat of global warming. Obviously there is overlap between these groups. – Jonathan G ewirtz responding to a Rummel post.

Jonathan is right, of course, that the UN isn’t what we thought it would be when I was growing up. I suspect he doesn’t know how strange it seems to be critical of it now, how strange to worry about its usefulness. I’m one of those who was taught at a young age the UN is good, but that is because it represented much that we still like: a forum for international debate, a chance to listen to other perspectives. The critics either seemed to see it as wielding power it didn’t have (the black helicopter types) or were isolationists. I can understand drawing back from the world in the fifties; Europe seen from a tank and Asia from a Navy deck didn’t make the world outside our borders all that attractive. But, frankly, distaste for the UN was associated with the kind of cranks who, a few years later, would obsess about the Kennedy assassination.

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According to this news item, the House International Relations Committee has drafted a bill that will require sweeping reforms at the United Nations. If they don’t comply then the United States will withhold up to 50% of its yearly dues.

The United Nations is in the midst of a fiscal crisis. The organization relies on member states paying yearly dues in order to remain solvent, but in recent years many governments have cut back on the amount of money they pay. Private donations are also falling off mainly because people are finally waking up to the fact that the organization is completely inefficient and wasteful, if not downright inept and corrupt. Their handling of the tsunami crises, as well as their attempts to steal credit for the good works of others, certainly didn’t help matters any.

So far as the HIRC is concerned, it has been one of the driving forces in the United States government to bring accountability to the UN. It’s a thankless job, but someone should have done it long ago. Making future dues payments conditional on reforms is brilliant, and it hits the UN where it hurts.

But I think the bill is doomed to failure, even though I think it’s a good idea and wouldn’t mind seeing it in place. There are two reasons for this.

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First thing’s first.

Murdoc Online is asking for your help. He wants anyone who has a link that states what the United Nations has done to help the tsunami victims to let him know. He’s rather droll when he frames his request, but it’s a sincere one.

Let me say that this is something that I’m very interested in myself. If there is evidence that the UN actually fed someone or worked to save lives in danger from the tsunami crises, then I’ll gladly put the link up here for all to see.

Please note that press conferences where the UN claims credit for work that others have done isn’t good enough. We need a link to a news report, something where the author was standing next to a line of refugees receiving food from UN personnel.

The next item I’d like to bring to your attention is this post at The Diplomad. They respond to some of their critics by pointing out where the majority of money donated to the UN actually goes. It’s certainly an eye opener.

If you do click on that last link, check out the first comment. It’s worth a read.

This news item has the headline “UN SAYS TSUNAMI DONORS MOVING WITH RECORD SPEED”.

International donors have moved with record speed to meet a near $1.0 billion appeal for immediate aid to victims of Asia’s tsunami, with over 70 percent already raised, the United Nations said Tuesday.

(snip)

“This has never happened before that two weeks after a disaster we have $717 million that we can spend on immediate emergency relief effort,” Egeland told a final news conference.

The news item points out that the $717 million comes from 80 countries. According to this post from The Diplomad, the US has pledged about the same amount, and we’ve been spending more than $5 million a day by using our military to move the aid to the affected region. So far as I know, the United Nations still hasn’t fed a single refugee.

I found it interesting that the article discussed ways that the UN was thinking of implementing so people could track what happens to the money. They make no bones of the fact that the Oil for Food debacle has caused this sudden concern for transparency.

It looks like the UN is hurting due and trying to shore up their damaged credibility.

In closing, I’d like to point to this BBC article, which says that the UN’s own watchdog agency has confirmed that UN troops have been sexually abusing the people they’ve been tasked with protecting. Some of the victims were children, and it would appear that the abuse is still going on even though the UN knows about it.

I suppose the victims of the tsunami should thank their lucky stars that the US military is at the fore when it comes to aid.