Negotiators scramble to agree on U.N. reform: Sweeping changes unlikely to be adopted at summit
September 13, 2005
CNN
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/13/un.summit.ap/index.html
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Negotiators met into the early hours Tuesday to try to reach agreement on a watered-down plan for reforming the United Nations, having abandoned many of the sweeping changes Secretary-General Kofi Annan recommended.
With some heads of state already in New York for Wednesday's opening of a three-day U.N. summit, the diplomats were running out of time for producing a substantive document for world leaders to adopt.
Mark Malloch Brown, the secretary-general's chief of staff, said negotiations seemed more favorable than a few days ago because deadlines are starting to loosen minds and positions.
There's a threshold where we always knew we wouldn't get the full loaf, he said. We've got to start counting slices. Half or more will do at this stage.
But Germany's U.N. Ambassador Gunter Pleuger said late Monday that the divisions made it impossible to get the great reform at this late date. Instead, he expected either a watered-down version of the present 39-page text or a shorter, more political text.
It's tough going, sometimes rough going, said Pakistan's U.N. Ambassador Munir Akram.
Annan says the United Nations needs revamping if it is to meet the challenges of the 21st century. He came out with a list of recommendations in March that General Assembly President Jean Ping turned into a draft summit document in June. It has gone through numerous drafts.
The seven issues facing negotiators were terrorism; a stronger Human Rights Council to replace the discredited Human Rights Commission; a new Peacebuilding Commission to help nations emerging from conflict; new responsibility for governments to protect civilians from genocide and war crimes; disarmament and nuclear weapons proliferation; overhauling U.N. management; and the promotion of economic development.
Annan also had urged the 191 U.N. member states to agree on a plan to expand the powerful U.N. Security Council, but the negotiations became so contentious the idea was shelved last month.
Akram said the negotiators, ambassadors from 15 countries, had agreed to language on terrorism, the Peacebuilding Commission and on human rights. Negotiators were also close to agreement on the responsibility to protect, but still differed on management reforms, trade and climate change, he said.
The Pakistani ambassador said he expected a core group of 32 countries to make a judgment Tuesday on whether the entire text is sufficiently balanced to be presented to all 191 U.N. members, and then in the larger group our hope is that nobody will pull it apart.
Many of the agreements were reached by leaving the most contentious issues to further negotiations.
For example, the United States and many European countries want the Human Rights Council to become a permanent body, with a country's membership requiring approval by two-thirds of U.N. nations. Richard Grenell, spokesman for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, said Egypt and China opposed that Monday, and other diplomats said Russia did as well.
Egyptian Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz said it was too early to decide the council's status.
Let us give it a chance to function, and then we will review it, he said.
His country favors a council that would be a subsidiary body of the U.N. General Assembly.
Germany's Pleuger said member states underestimated the amount of preparatory work needed to reach consensus. The negotiating process also was thrown into disarray when United States submitted hundreds of amendments a few weeks ago, he said.
We have reached a fork in the road, Annan warned member nations. If you, the political leaders of the world's nations, cannot reach agreement on the way forward, history will take the decisions for you, and the interests of your peoples may go by default.