P. A. Chacko
For over 70 years,
the United Nations was meant to be a beacon of hope for an ever better world.
This world organization was instituted as a beacon of hope for an ever better evolving world.
Since its inception in 1945, it was to be a uniting force among countries and seek global solutions towards peace.
Such solutions were to be in the context of ever emerging tensions between nations, poverty, resource exploitation and its consequent adverse effect on humanity, climatic disasters, lack of sustainable development, growing chasm betwern the rich and the poor, vulnerability of the deprived, etc.
Problems facing women, children, the aged, migrants, nuclear threat also were to be on the anvil.
Today when the Secretary General calls upon “all countries to keep this beacon for the world, and its ideals, shining”, one wonders how effective the UN has been all through.
Wars in Syria, Ukraine, Middle East and the African continent are clear examples of UN becoming a toothless giant.
Its strong arm, the Security Council, has been hijacked by more powerful nations like the US and Russia. The veto power has become a pliable tool in their hands to stonewall any decisions which may come against their interest.
The way the US has been manipulating the UN by vetoing resolutions against Israel’s war on innocents in Gaza has been preposterous. The US has its interests. Israel as the buyer of US weapons, its need for the Middle East oil, its political hegemony etc. are the US agenda.
Russia’s destruction of the Ukraine, the protracted war in Syria are also burning issues. The Russian vetoes also have been playing havoc.
Like administering placebo, the UN sends its Peace Keepers during conflicts only to remain as helpless onlookers or to be killed by warring Nations.
If the UN has to have any meaning for its continuing existence, the present Security Council structure has to be demolished and restructured with more nations as members and better rules of conduct.
The world in crisis does not need a UN on a stretcher or a limping elephant.