World Bulletin
 The President’s Corner: Tom Miller
Setting the Record Straight:
The Aftermath of Obama’s Visit to the UN
Oct. 7 – Out in California, where I met with UNA members up and down the coast last week, from San Francisco to Monterey to Santa Barbara to Pasadena, I heard how overjoyed everyone was that President Barack Obama spoke so powerfully at the opening of the General Assembly; as president of the Security Council; and at the UN’s Climate Summit – all in one week.
The president also squeezed in a meeting with leaders of sub-Saharan Africa; with the Friends of Democratic Pakistan; and at the other side of Midtown Manhattan at the Clinton Global Initiative. He also met with leaders of countries that contribute to UN peacekeeping. The meeting clarified once and for all that the US will not contribute troops to the peacekeeping operations but will pay US bills to the UN and on time.
On Friday of the same week, Obama also went to Pittsburgh for the G20 conference, where he and Prime Minister Brown and President Nicholas Sarkozy of France together rebuked Iran for concealing a major nuclear facility.
I was present at the General Assembly Hall when the president delivered his much-anticipated speech on Sept. 23, interrupted with applause often. The atmosphere was remarkable; the mood was optimistic and energized, and the speech’s focus – titled “Responsibility for Our Common Future,” could not have been more welcome by member states.
Yet throughout the speech, I and many others waited for President Obama to bring up a term -- the “responsibility to protect.” This relatively new UN norm, if universally accepted, will help the UN galvanize resources and the will of member states to protect people when their governments either fail to do so or when their own governments commit atrocities against them. The scope of “responsibility to protect” is restricted to four crimes: genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. The doctrine was debated this summer, and a resolution was overwhelmingly passed by member states in the 63rd General Assembly supporting R2P, as it is known, which represents the first step in moving this initiative forward.
Though the term did not come up in Obama’s speech, the word “responsibility” did. (UNA researchers report that he used the word at least 15 times.) This was gratifying to hear, as we at UNA and other nongovernmental organizations do not want the concept of “responsibility to protect” to become simply more UN rhetoric. When the basic human rights of people – their lives -- are in danger, the rights of states are secondary. If the doctrine had been in place sooner, we mostly likely would not have witnessed Rwanda, Srebrenica, Darfur and other incredible mass crimes unfold.
Like my own judgments of Obama’s speech, some media – in newspapers, radio, blogs, Twitter feeds and talk shows – generally applauded but also found fault with what he said at the UN. More important, there was so much coverage around the world that it served to reinforce that the UN remains the most important international forum for addressing world affairs and is an indispensable venue for the US to advance its foreign policy agenda.
I savored the opening line in an editorial in The New York Times about Obama’s speech to the General Assembly: “President Obama took another step toward repairing America’s battered image.”
And though some criticism was slight – one columnist called the UN an “international zoo” – and others took a more hardhearted approach, I read as much as I could, finding the arguments stimulating and provocative.
Why does the UN, some pundits asked, let tyrants like Col. Muammar Qaddafi of Libya and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran even a chance to speak for 15 minutes (or longer, as the case with Qaddafi)? Because the UN is meant to be a democratic forum, allowing everyone who belongs, which is 192 countries, a chance to express their homeland’s gripes, concerns and grievances, regardless of how unsavory the comments might seem to many of us.
Despite Qaddafi’s 90-minute ramble to the General Assembly, many of the speakers who followed were succinct and to the point. Thalif Deen covered the opening of the 64th assembly extensively in the Inter Press Service, a media outlet that caters to the developing world. Yes, he devoted much space to Qaddafi’s speech, but he also delved into other addresses, including a look at what Chinese President Hu Jintao said (that the international community “should adhere to the purposes and principles of the UN charter and seek peaceful solutions to regional hotspot issues and international disputes”); as well as reporting on the remarks of Dmitiri Medvedev of Russian and Jacob Zuma of South Africa.
Obama’s foreign policy approach, specifically his “engagement” methods with certain world leaders, was debated by members of the media as well. Obama’s new method of multilateral diplomacy, one op-ed stated, suggested that he has “embraced the UN enthusiastically.” Others found the president’s willingness to talk to tyrants dubious. Yet, Obama’s engagement approach to threatening world problems and ominous world leaders took an interesting turn last week, when the first steps toward interacting with the Iranians on nuclear weapons bore modest results: Iran agreed to open its recently discovered uranium enrichment plant to international inspection. As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said of the meeting, which took place in Geneva, it “opened the door.”
We at UNA were encouraged by the events at the General Assembly and the variety of reactions to the speeches, galvanizing us more than ever to disseminate fact-based information about the UN and to continue to provide Americans with the knowledge they need to make informed judgments about world affairs. Here are some important nuggets far removed from the speeches in New York: Did you know that last week the UN came to the rescue of the victims of the earthquake in West Sumatra, setting up a joint mission to help coordinate assessments for relief and search for survivors? Or that more than 116,000 peacekeeping personnel are deployed in 15 hot spots around the world? That the UN’s refugee agency is now taking care of about 10 million homeless. That the World Food Program will feed 108 million people in 74 countries this year? And that at least five people were killed on Monday at the agency’s office in Islamabad, Pakistan, from a suicide bombing?
Tom Miller is president and chief executive of UNA-USA.
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