"The normal rules of diplomacy, grounded in politesse, quiet persuasion and trust, are proving to be woefully inadequate, just as the normal rules of international relations were found woefully inadequate more than 80 years ago. Fifty-one nations signed up to create a new world order from the ashes of the second world war, aiming, as Hammarskjold the influential second secretary general liked to say and UN officials now quote as a mantra: not to take mankind to heaven but to save humanity from hell."
"Eleanor Roosevelt, Doc Evatt, Jessie Street, Dag Hammarskjold and the other founders of the United Nations must be spinning in their graves. No one who believes that the world could be a better place thinks that the UN is perfect, but the language the US president used in his address to the general assembly offered no hope. When he began by threatening the operator of the Teleprompter with very big trouble, the audience of world leaders tittered with nervous laughter."
The US president delivered a confrontational 57-minute address to the UN General Assembly, exceeding his allotted time and threatening the teleprompter operator. The speech ridiculed the climate crisis as a con, accused the UN of enabling assaults on Western borders, and portrayed many countries as failing. Delegates reacted with nervous laughter, brief applause and selfies despite evident tensions. Traditional diplomacy based on politesse, quiet persuasion and trust is described as inadequate. The UN was created by 51 nations after World War II to prevent global catastrophe, with figures like Hammarskjold, Doc Evatt and Jessie Street shaping its founding principles and opposing sex discrimination.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]