by Alex Evans | Feb 11, 2008 | Middle East and North Africa, North America, South Asia
James Kirchik, writing in the New Republic, discusses the “admittedly bizarre rumor circulating at the United Nations and the State Department, where many are speculating that Khalilzad–currently America’s ambassador to the United Nations and the highest-ranking Muslim to serve in the Bush administration–is contemplating a run for Karzai’s job”. Kirchik continues:
…Khalilzad himself has done little to quiet the speculation, offering only vague, quasi-denials in person and through his spokespeople. Asked about the rumor while speaking at Columbia University earlier this month, Khalilzad first joked, “I didn’t come here to collect contributions for my campaign. I know how poor students are.” He then added, “I can say categorically that I am not a candidate for the presidency of Afghanistan.”
Lest you think that sounds like a categorical denial: “as a U.N. diplomat stressed to me, he only said he was not currently running, rather than saying he would never run”. Sounding like the fevered speculations of a media machine looking for a story? Perhaps so, but
A former State Department official told me that Khalilzad should have immediately deflated the rumor himself, and that his recent comments on the matter are still too equivocal. “When you’re the U.S. ambassador, confirmed by the U.S. Senate, representing the U.S. government, one should not tolerate rumors that you’re interested in running a foreign government,” this person told me. “It can easily be put to rest with an unequivocal, firm ‘I have no intention of seeking the office,’ ” says Bruce Riedel, a friend of Khalilzad who served on the National Security Council during the Clinton and second Bush administrations. “Why does this [rumor] keep surfacing?”
by Alex Evans | Jan 25, 2008 | Climate and resource scarcity, Economics and development
One I missed from December last year:
A struggle by nations to secure sources of clean water will be “potent fuel” for war, the first Asia-Pacific Water Summit heard yesterday. The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Ban Ki Moon, told delegates from across the region that the planet faced a water crisis that was especially troubling for Asia. High population growth, rising consumption, pollution and poor water management posed significant threats, he said, adding that climate change was also making “a bad situation worse”.
Mr Ban went on to condemn the lack of heed paid by governments to these warning signs: “Throughout the world, water resources continue to be spoiled, wasted and degraded. The consequences for humanity are grave. Water scarcity threatens economic and social gains and is a potent fuel for wars and conflict.”
Say what you like about Ban, he’s running with resource scarcity and climate change in a way that Kofi Annan never did…
by Alex Evans | Jan 24, 2008 | Influence and networks
From Der Spiegel via Matt Yglesias: Hasbro is planning to launch the first global version of Monopoly, and they’re canvassing votes for which cities should be included. As Der Spiegel puts it, cities all over the world are urging residents to “vote early and vote often”: for
Forget a seat on the United Nations Security Council. The place where the citizens of the world can really play with the big boys is actually within reach: a place on the new global Monopoly board.
Nor is this just a game – not by a long shot:
The marketing potential of being included on the board has not escaped tourist authorities. Edinburgh, currently ranked 14th [but sliding – at the time of posting it’s fallen to 18th], is hoping to attract more visitors with the Monopoly midas touch. VisitScotland marketing manager Kathryn Macdonald told the BBC that it will give the already popular tourist destination a boost. “This is a fantastic opportunity for Scotland’s capital city,” she said on Tuesday, adding: “We encourage everyone to take the time to vote for their favorite city.”
A quick visit to the leaderboard shows that London is in the top two, and hence on track for one of the two coveted navy blue slots – along with Paris.
But here at GD, we like to think we’re above these narrow parochial concerns. What we’re interested in is who gets to be the two utilities. One’s the United Nations, obviously. But the other?
by Alex Evans | Jan 21, 2008 | Cooperation and coherence, Influence and networks, UK
Adam Boulton at Sky News, travelling with the PM in India, gives us a heads-up of another speech on multilateral reform:
The Prime Minister believes that the world has changed so much since then that we need to rewrite the rules. He is particularly interested in the growing might of the so-called BRICs – Brazil, Russia, India and China – the last two of which he is visiting on this tour. Mr Brown cheered his hosts by repeating Britain’s longstanding view that India should join Britain, France, the US, Russia and China with a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. But in return he wants India to do more in the global conflict against fundamentalist terrorism. The Prime Minister also wants the UN to establish a standing rapid response team of judges, police, and civilian experts who can be deployed immediately to stabilize countries immediately following violent conflicts.
He seems to have the sub-prime mortgage crisis and the knock on collapse of Northern Rock on his mind in his ideas for the IMF. Mr Brown says it shoud become the “early warning system for financial turbulence”, with the powers to intervene as soon as potential financial crisis are identified. He wants the World Bank to focust on the environment as well as it’s existing mission of poverty reduction. He wants to set up a global climate change fund (Britain has already earmarked $1.6 billion for a similar project). This would be the carrot for poor countries to do something about their carbon emissions complementing the stick of rich nation threats.
Hang on, you say, isn’t there a slight sense of deja vu here? Why yes: it’s the same as his last speech on multilateral reform – and as I observed at the time, that speech in turn read like a re-run of the 2004 UN High Level Panel on threats, challenges and change. To be fair, it’s hard to find fault with the content. But it would be welcome to hear more about how the PM plans to achieve all this, given the snail’s pace of multilateral reform discussions over the last few years.
by Richard Gowan | Nov 28, 2007 | Conflict and security
I’ll spare readers further extended commentary on the grim outlook for peacekeeping (although, just to add to the fun, it’s worth checking out the new piece by Charles Grant and Tomas Valasek of CER on how Bosnia can go bad too) but it’s hard to overlook Jean-Marie Guehenno’s challenge to the Security Council yesterday. After a dour briefing on the obstacles to getting into Darfur, and holding out the opportunity of one last round of talks with Sudan to sort things out, the UN peacekeeping chief summed up:
Should the anticipated discussions fail to clear the path to the deployment of an effective force, the international community will be confronted with hard choices: do we move ahead with the deployment of a force that will not make a difference, that will not have the capability to defend itself, and that carries the risk of humiliation of the Security Council and the United Nations, and tragic failure for the people of Darfur?
The emphasis was in the original.
