Category: UN INSIDER

By Jamshed Baruah

WARSAW (IDN) – Cooperation with the United Nations is becoming “increasingly important” for the world’s leading military alliance, NATO. The 28-nation bloc is therefore ready to “further deepen” existing interaction with the world body, particularly in view of the multiplying challenges to international peace and security.

While NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg stressed that the military bloc “poses no threat to any country,” its leaders agreed to enhance NATO’s military presence on the Russian borders in the east, with four battalions in Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania on a rotational basis – to be in place starting 2017.

Political observers expect this decision to deepen tensions with Russia, which would be reflected in the UN Security Council’s deliberations influenced by five veto wielding permanent members (P5): U.S., Russia, China, Britain and France.

BERLIN (IDN) – Germany is supporting the Albert Einstein German Academic Refugee Initiative (DAFI) at the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees by providing 2500 additional scholarships, according to the Federal Foreign Office. The DAFI programme enables those recognised as refugees to access university education in their country of first admission.

It is particularly Syrian refugees in Syria’s neighbouring countries who stand to benefit from the new student grants. Up to 1000 scholarships will be awarded in Turkey, a further 700 will be available for refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt and northern Iraq.

By Ramesh Jaura

BERLIN | NEW YORK (IDN) – The nomination of Christiana Figueres for the position of the United Nations Secretary-General one day after her term as Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) ended on July 6, comes as a checkmate to five other female and six male candidates vying for the world’s top diplomatic post.

President Luis Guillermo Solís announced on July 7 that the Costa Rican government is nominating Christiana Figueres because “the United Nations, and the world, needs a Secretary-General who is a bridge builder, who can listen and consult, who can help resolve disputes, build agreements and anticipate problems”.

By J Nastranis

NEW YORK (IDN) – The Indian police officers, deployed as part of a Formed Police Unit (FPU), played a critical role in contributing to the United Nations peacekeeping mission’s success in Liberia, according to statements by President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and other senior UN officials.

FPUs have three core duties: public order management, protection of United Nations personnel and facilities and support to such police operations that require a concerted response but do not respond to military threats.

The United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) handed over security responsibility to national forces on June 30, 2016. Since Liberia’s civil war ended in 2003, UNMIL has been supporting the West African nation to rebuild its institutions so as to enable it maintain stability without its presence.

NEW YORK (IDN) – The Human Rights Institute of South Africa has expressed disappointment at the South African vote against a resolution by the United Nations Human Rights Council on civil society, reports GroundUp. The resolution, aimed at creating safe spaces for civil society to operate, was passed on July 1, 2016 with 31 votes for, 7 against, and 9 abstentions. 

The resolution, known as A/HRC/32/L.29, was introduced by Chile, Ireland, Japan, Sierra Leone and Tunisia. It was widely supported by civil society around the world; 244 organisations signed an open letter urging members of the Council to vote for the adoption of the resolution, including the Human Rights Institute of South Africa and international organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch which have a presence in the country.

NEW YORK (IDN) – A United Nations human rights expert has deplored the wave of ageist attacks in the wake of the United Kingdom’s referendum to leave the European Union, including calls for age ceilings for the exercise of the right to vote, reports the UN News Service.

“We have seen a number of European national newspapers and social media outlets stigmatizing older persons as the scapegoats for Brexit and calling for restrictions on ‘grey’ votes,” said Rosa Kornfeld-Matte, the UN independent expert on the enjoyment of all human rights by older persons. “General exclusions of the exercise of certain rights based on age are unacceptable under international human rights law,” she stressed.

By Jutta Wolf

BERLIN | ROME (IDN) – Three Rome-based UN agencies are keen to avert further havoc wreaked by the twins with euphemistic names – ‘The Little Boy’ and ‘The Little Girl’ – and are calling for governments and the international community to ramp up efforts to safeguard livelihoods of some 100 million people around the world.

“The new pattern of climate events (better known by their Spanish designations, El Niño and La Niña) is exposing weaknesses in our preparedness, in international and government systems and in community infrastructure,” says the newly-appointed United Nations Special Envoy on El Niño & Climate Ambassador Macharia Kamau.

By Jaya Ramachandran

NEW YORK (IDN) – Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority have rejected a report by the so-called Middle East Quartet – comprising the UN, Russia, the United States and the European Union – urging both parties to indulge in “meaningful negotiations that resolve all final status issues”.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed the report, saying that it “perpetuates the myth that Israeli construction in the West Bank is an obstacle to peace.” The Palestine Authority President Mahmoud Abbas reportedly said the report doesn’t meet the Palestinians’ expectations ‘as a nation living under a foreign colonial military occupation.’

The report was released on July 1, two days after the killing of a 13-year old girl by a Palestinian youth. It calls on Israel and Palestine to “independently demonstrate, through policies and actions, a genuine commitment to the two-state solution” and to “refrain from unilateral steps that prejudice the outcome of the final negotiations”.

Viewpoint by Mirjam van Reisen

BRUSSELS (IDN) – The UN Human Rights Council has adopted a ground-breaking resolution following the presentation of the report by the Commission of Inquiry (COI) on Human Rights in Eritrea. The Eritrean government has rejected the Commission’s findings.

The Council expresses deep concern at the Commission’s findings that there are reasonable grounds to believe that Crimes against Humanity have been committed in Eritrea since 1991.

The resolution requests the General Assembly “to submit the report and the oral updates of the commission of inquiry to all relevant organs of the UN for consideration and appropriate action”.

Though the resolution does not specifically mention the Security Council, its referral the United Nations’ most powerful body, with “primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security” would open the way for the findings to be presented to the International Criminal Court.

By J Nastranis

NEW YORK (IDN) – The United Nations, Russia, the United States and the European Union, known as ‘the diplomatic Quartet’, have pledged active support for ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on the basis of pertinent Security Council resolutions.

They also reaffirm that a negotiated two-State outcome meeting Israel’s security needs and Palestinians’ aspirations for statehood and sovereignty, ends the occupation that began in 1967, and resolves all permanent status issues is the only way to achieve an enduring peace.

Summarizing the first ever report by the diplomatic Quartet to the Security Council. the United Nations envoy Nickolay Mladenov warned that continuing violence, terrorism and incitement, settlement expansion, and the Palestinian Authority’s lack of control of Gaza are hurting the Middle East peace process.